Metabolic constraints drive self-organization of specialized cell groups
- InStem - Institute for Stem Cell Science and Regenerative Medicine, India
- National Centre for Biological Sciences‐Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, India
Abstract
How phenotypically distinct states in isogenic cell populations appear and stably co-exist remains unresolved. We find that within a mature, clonal yeast colony developing in low glucose, cells arrange into metabolically disparate cell groups. Using this system, we model and experimentally identify metabolic constraints sufficient to drive such self-assembly. Beginning in a uniformly gluconeogenic state, cells exhibiting a contrary, high pentose phosphate pathway activity state, spontaneously appear and proliferate, in a spatially constrained manner. Gluconeogenic cells in the colony produce and provide a resource, which we identify as trehalose. Above threshold concentrations of external trehalose, cells switch to the new metabolic state and proliferate. A self-organized system establishes, where cells in this new state are sustained by trehalose consumption, which thereby restrains other cells in the trehalose producing, gluconeogenic state. Our work suggests simple physico-chemical principles that determine how isogenic cells spontaneously self-organize into structured assemblies in complimentary, specialized states.
Data availability
All data in this study are generated by computational simulations. All model parameters and equations are included in the manuscript and source code is included with this submission.
Article and author information
Author details
Funding
Wellcome Trust - DBT India Alliance (IA/I/14/2/501523)
- Sunil Laxman
Simons Foundation
- Vaibhhav Sinha
- Sandeep Krishna
Wellcome Trust - DBT India Alliance (IA/E/16/1/502996)
- Sriram Varahan
The funders had no role in study design, data collection and interpretation, or the decision to submit the work for publication.
Copyright
© 2019, Varahan et al.
This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License permitting unrestricted use and redistribution provided that the original author and source are credited.
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Metabolic constraints drive self-organization of specialized cell groups
eLife 8:e46735.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.46735
Further reading
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- Cell Biology
- Developmental Biology
The bone-resorbing activity of osteoclasts plays a critical role in the life-long remodeling of our bones that is perturbed in many bone loss diseases. Multinucleated osteoclasts are formed by the fusion of precursor cells, and larger cells – generated by an increased number of cell fusion events – have higher resorptive activity. We find that osteoclast fusion and bone resorption are promoted by reactive oxygen species (ROS) signaling and by an unconventional low molecular weight species of La protein, located at the osteoclast surface. Here, we develop the hypothesis that La’s unique regulatory role in osteoclast multinucleation and function is controlled by an ROS switch in La trafficking. Using antibodies that recognize reduced or oxidized species of La, we find that differentiating osteoclasts enrich an oxidized species of La at the cell surface, which is distinct from the reduced La species conventionally localized within cell nuclei. ROS signaling triggers the shift from reduced to oxidized La species, its dephosphorylation and delivery to the surface of osteoclasts, where La promotes multinucleation and resorptive activity. Moreover, intracellular ROS signaling in differentiating osteoclasts oxidizes critical cysteine residues in the C-terminal half of La, producing this unconventional La species that promotes osteoclast fusion. Our findings suggest that redox signaling induces changes in the location and function of La and may represent a promising target for novel skeletal therapies.
