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Comment
. 2018 Jul 12;174(2):253-255.
doi: 10.1016/j.cell.2018.06.050.

Translating the Physical Code of Life

Benjamin D Knapp  1 , Kerwyn Casey Huang  2
Affiliations
Comment

Translating the Physical Code of Life

Benjamin D Knapp et al. Cell. .

Abstract

The cytoplasm is a highly crowded and complex environment, and the regulation of its physical properties has only recently begun to be revealed. In this issue of Cell, Delarue et al. demonstrate that the control of ribosome concentration through mTORC1 sets limits on the diffusion of large particles and controls phase separation in eukaryotic cells.

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Figures

Figure 1:
Figure 1:. Ribosome concentration controls phase separation through crowding, as revealed by GEMs
(A) Genetically encoded multimers (GEMs) are protein scaffolds used to study the diffusive behavior of mesoscopic particles (15-40 nm) in the cytoplasm. Ribosome production and autophagy counterbalance for crowding homeostasis, but inhibiting mechanistic target of rapamycin 1 (mTORC1), responsible for ribosome synthesis, increases GEM diffusion rates. (B) This crowding homeostasis is also necessary for liquid phase separation.
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References

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