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Working with bacteria, a multidisciplinary team from the University of California at San Diego has shed light on a long-standing scientific question: what are the underlying mechanisms that control cell size?
Nearly five years ago, a team led by Suckjoon Jun, a biophysicist at UC San Diego, discovered that cell size is controlled by a fundamental process called "adder", a function that guides the cells so that they grow in a fixed added size, from birth to birth. division. Yet mysteries remain about the mechanisms behind the process, leading to a scientific race to discover.
Publishing their work in the May 16 issue of Current biology, Jun, lead authors Fangwei Si and William Le Treut and their colleagues describe the inner workings of the adder. They discovered that the process, also called "homeostasis of size", boiled down to two essential components: the balanced synthesis of specific biological ingredients for cell division, including some proteins; and a critical threshold that initiates the adder process when a sufficient number of such proteins accumulate. The adder process then flows from these two requirements, say the scientists.
"It's a very robust mechanism because every cell will reach its target size, whether it's born small or large," said Jun, associate professor at the Division of Molecular Biology of the Division of Biological Sciences and Department of Physical Sciences Division. of physics. "The essential thing is that we found that the adder is exclusively determined by some key proteins involved in cell division."
Although researchers have discovered the mechanisms of Escherichia coli (E. coli) and Bacillus subtilis (B. subtilis) bacteria, they believe that the process is general in many life forms.
According to Jun, the research team, made up of biologists, physicists and engineers, has discovered the adder's case after years of attempts to set up a range of investigative methods and experimental approaches. .
"Cell size-related homeostasis is a fundamental biological issue and, to our knowledge, it's the first time we finally understand its mechanistic origin," said Jun. We would not have been able to solve this problem in pure physics or biology. multidisciplinary approach. "
The research team is currently investigating whether the quantitative and mechanistic framework underlying the addition applies to other models such as yeast and cancer cells.
In addition to Si, The Treut and Jun, the article's co-authors include John Sauls from the Department of Physics at the University of San Diego; and Stephen Vadia and Petra Anne Levin from Washington University in St. Louis.
The study was funded by the Paul G. Allen Family Foundation, the Pew Charitable Trusts, a CAREER grant from the National Science Foundation (MCB-1253843) and the National Institutes of Health (R01 GM118565-01 and R35- 400 GM127331).
Source of the story:
Material provided by University of California – San Diego. Original written by Mario Aguilera. Note: Content can be changed for style and length.
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