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Cell biology

Two pores better than one?

Nature volume 438, pages 299–300 (2005)Cite this article

The movement of proteins through a cell's membrane requires a dedicated molecular machine. A glimpse of this apparatus in action shows that it has two channels, and hints at how these pores might be regulated.

A cell's membrane bristles with proteins that sense and communicate with its environment, and the cell secretes other proteins to send messages farther afield. To reach their destination, these proteins must travel from the aqueous environment of the cytoplasm where they are synthesized, through the seemingly impenetrable boundary of the lipid membrane. To ease the proteins' emigration, cells use a specialized protein complex called a translocase to direct proteins across or into the membrane. On page 318 of this issue, Mitra et al.1 report the structure of this remarkable complex caught in the act of inserting a newly synthesized protein into the membrane.

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Figure 1: Initial stages of the translocase mechanism, a model proposed by Mitra et al.1.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. the Department of Molecular Microbiology, Groningen Biomolecular Sciences and Biotechnology Institute, and the Materials Sciences Center Plus, University of Groningen, Haren, 9751 NN, The Netherlands

    Arnold J. M. Driessen

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  1. Arnold J. M. Driessen
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Driessen, A. Two pores better than one?. Nature 438, 299–300 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1038/438299a

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