Move, Migrate, Manoeuvre

If you could squeeze through keyholes, where would you go? Some immune cells, called dendritic cells (DCs), manoeuvre through small gaps as they patrol your tissues for invaders. Structures called podosomes inside the cell help sense what kind of material it’s passing through. Podosomes are bundles of proteins which protrude from the cell membrane and help the cell judge how best to move. The image shows a DC moving over a slide – each colour indicates the position of a podosome cluster at a different time point. Recent research has found that nearby podosomes interact with each other by exchanging their components in particular patterns, depending on the properties of the material the cell is travelling over. This could act as a signal to co-ordinate the movement of a cluster of podosomes. Understanding cell movement can tell us how immune cells travel and how skin cells migrate to heal wounds.

Written by Esther Redhouse White

Esther Redhouse White

Writer

A recent Biochemistry graduate from York, Esther has worked on bacterial killing proteins and genetic switches in worms. In her spare time she likes visiting museums full of skeletons.

• Image from work by Marjolein B. M. Meddens and colleagues
• Radboud Institute for Molecular Life Sciences, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen, The Netherlands and McGill University Otto Maass Chemistry Building, Montreal, Quebec, Canada
• Image originally published under a Creative Commons Licence (BY 4.0)
• Published in Nature Communications, October 2016