Traffic of macromolecules among membrane-bound organelles (conferencia)

MAYORGA, LS

Mendoza

Simposio; LACE 2018. 24th Latin American Symposium; 2018

LACE

The eukaryotic cell has multiple intracellular organelles. For its normal functioning, certain macromolecules must be transported from one compartment to another efficiently and selectively. Hundreds of factors are known that are required for intracellular transport, but we are far from understanding how transport occurs [1]. Using very ingenious experimental methods, we can inhibit or exacerbate the function of a factor and observe which stage of transport is affected; and yet, we do not know how transport is accomplished. The lesson is that it is not enough to have a list of factors organized in a given order; cell biology requires urgently to generate more functional data by means of analytical methods able to scrutinize the interior of the cell[2]. In our laboratory, we have characterized the exocytosis of the acrosomal granule in human sperm, an event that is an absolute requirement for fertilization [3]. We are also interested in the transport of type I histocompatibility complexes during cross-presentation in dendritic cells, a fundamental process for the immune response [4]. In muscle cells, we study the Glut4 glucose channel transport that is necessary for an adequate insulin response. In all three models, we have characterized new factors and shown which stage of transport is affected. To integrate our experimental observation in a functional model, we have developed a modeling platform that combines two complementary strategies: ABM (agent-based modeling) and ODE (ordinary differential equations). We expect that the use of novel experimental techniques in combination with potent modeling strategies will foster the unveiling of the global logic governing the intracellular transport.