Membraneless Organelles: P Granules in Caenorhabditis Elegans

Overview

Journal Traffic

Publisher Wiley

Specialties Biology
Physiology

Date 2019 Mar 30

PMID 30924287

Citations 45

Authors

Elisabeth A Marnik

Dustin L Updike

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Membraneless organelles are distinct compartments within a cell that are not enclosed by a traditional lipid membrane and instead form through a process called liquid-liquid phase separation. Examples of these non-membrane-bound organelles include nucleoli, stress granules, P bodies, pericentriolar material and germ granules. Many recent studies have used Caenorhabditis elegans germ granules, known as P granules, to expand our understanding of the formation of these unique cellular compartments. From this work, we know that proteins with intrinsically disordered regions (IDRs) play a critical role in the process of phase separation. IDR phase separation is further tuned through their interactions with RNA and through protein modifications such as phosphorylation and methylation. These findings from C elegans, combined with work done in other model organisms, continue to provide insight into the formation of membraneless organelles and the important role they play in compartmentalizing cellular processes.

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