Methods for physical characterization of phase separated bodies and membrane-less organelles

作者：Diana M. Mitrea, Bappaditya Chandra, M. Ferrolino, E. Gibbs, Michele Tolbert, Michael R. H. White, R. Kriwacki · 发表于：Journal of Molecular Biology · 年份：2018 · DOI：10.1016/j.jmb.2018.07.006 · 被引用次数：148 · 研究领域：Medicine、Chemistry

Biochemical processes within eukaryotic cells are partially controlled through spatial and temporal organization of macromolecules. Cellular compartmentalization has long been appreciated, starting with early microscopic observations of unicellular organisms, and animal and plant tissues in the late 1600s, and later refined in the early 1950s through the advent of electron microscopy and improved sample preparation methods [1]. Two classes of sub-cellular compartments organize biological macromolecules within an eukaryotic cell. Membrane-bound organelles contain their components within a lipid bilayer membrane. Another type of compartments termed membrane-less organelles, however, are not delimited by membranes, but still maintain well-defined composition, structure and function. For example, the nucleus, a membrane-bound organelle, contains a sub-compartment termed the nucleolus that lacks a surrounding membrane. Since the discovery of the nucleolus [2], the largest membrane-less organelle, advances in electron and fluorescence microscopy and the development of imaging methods that exceed the visible light diffraction limit on spatial resolution, revealed that cells contain numerous other membrane-less organelles within the cytoplasm and the nucleus. However, an understanding of the physical basis for the formation of these cellular sub-compartments was elusive.