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News | 12/07/2019 | Press Release

The nucleolus – a known organelle with new tasks

The nucleolus is a well-known cellular structure that is easily visible under a light microscope. This nuclear structure is known as the site of ribosome production. In a recent study, researchers at the Max Planck Institute of Biochemistry including SyNergy member F.-Ulrich Hartl in Martinsried, Germany, have shown that the nucleolus is also a site of quality control for proteins. When cells are stressed, proteins tend to misfold and to aggregate. To prevent proteins from clumping, some are temporarily stored in the nucleolus. The special biophysical conditions found in this organelle prevent harmful protein aggregation. The results of this study have now been published in the journal Science.

One would like to believe that the basic cellular processes have already been deciphered and that research can now focus on the details. But even today, new fundamental principles are being discovered through the combination of modern methods. The nucleolus is a nuclear structure that was first described in the 1830s. In the 1960s it was recognized that ribosomes, the protein factories, are produced in this organelle. Researchers have known for some time that protein folding helpers, so-called chaperones, move into the nucleolus under certain circumstances. It has been suggested that this relocation is related to protein production. Now researchers from the Max Planck Institute (MPI) of Biochemistry have shown that the chaperones that move into the nucleolus are bound to stress-sensitive proteins.