Biological complexity: cell surface molecular activity (Introduction)

by David Turell , Friday, January 17, 2020, 18:11 (1554 days ago) @ David Turell

20 different proteins are active on a neuron's surface:

https://phys.org/news/2020-01-surveying-proteins-neuron-surface.html

"Cell surfaces are incredibly dynamic places, especially for cellular communication, says Luo, a neurobiologist at Stanford University. In the nervous system, proteins on the surfaces of nerve cells help the cells find each other and link up. Luo's team wanted a complete view of the proteins that direct connections in the developing fly brain. The researchers focused on proteins involved in forming olfactory networks, which control a fly's sense of smell.

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"Luo's team added a new twist to the technique. They made the enzyme target proteins on fruit fly olfactory neurons at a particular point in brain development: when neurons are making decisions about which connections to form. The team compared the proteins present in adult cells with those present in the developing brain. "The difference is actually very striking," Luo says.

"The team identified 20 proteins that were more abundant on the surfaces of developing neurons and knocked them down one by one to see if their absence had an effect on brain wiring. Surprising even to the researchers, all 20 were involved in wiring the fly olfactory network. What's more, many of the proteins they found hadn't even been known to play a role in neural development."

Comment: in embryology so much is iong on at teh saame time it demands the recognition of design, and a designer.