Cell News—Liquid separation in cell subcompartments

Photo by TJ McAfoos

Oil and water photo by TJ McAfoos

Like vinegar and oil in salad dressing, the cell nucleus and other cell compartments contain liquid subcompartments that don’t mix. But unlike the vinegar and oil in salad dressing, these subcompartments manage to not fuse into giant pools, like the components of dressing will if left to settle on the counter. ASCB members Marina Feric, Clifford Brangwynne, and colleagues at Princeton University and Washington University in St. Louis were interested in how these subcompartments form and how they stay segregated. They found that the features of macromolecular components, like protein structure, promote phase separation.  Biophysical properties, especially surface tension, cause the liquid phases to stay separate. Published in Cell.

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