Biology subjects

Zaganelli, S.

Publications and source records attributed to Zaganelli, S..

3 recordsLinked to original sources

bioRxiv2025

Nuclear envelope budding is a non-canonical mechanism to export large transcripts in muscle cells

In recent years, nuclear envelope budding (NEB) has emerged as an alternative route for nuclear export of viral particles that are too large to pass through the nuclear pore complex. Yet, the significance of this unconventional export pathway for large endogenous cargoes in mammalian cells has remained largely unexplored. Here, we use a combination of electron and fluorescence microscopy to demonstrate that NEB events occur following myoblast differentiation into myotubes and concomitant with the expression of extremely long muscle-specific transcripts. We show that NE buds are derived from the inner nuclear membrane, contain internal vesicles, and are specifically enriched with long sarcomeric transcripts. We identify a role for the protein UIF in regulating mRNA cargo targeting into NE buds and show that this pathway requires the ESCRT-III membrane remodeling machinery. Our findings uncover a non-canonical pathway for large transcript nuclear export in muscle cells and provide insight into its mechanism.

cell biology↗

bioRxiv2020

Distinct molecular signatures of fission predict mitochondrial degradation or proliferation

Mitochondrial fission is a highly regulated process which, when disrupted, can alter metabolism, proliferation and apoptosis1-3. The downstream effects have implications for many diseases, from neurodegeneration4-6 to cardiovascular disease7,8 and cancer9,10. Key components of the fission machinery have been identified: constriction sites are initiated by the endoplasmic reticulum (ER)11 and actin12 before dynamin-related protein 1 (Drp1)13 is recruited to the outer mitochondrial membrane via adaptor proteins14-17, where it drives constriction and scission of the membrane18. In the life cycle of mitochondria, fission is important for the biogenesis of new mitochondria as well as the clearance of dysfunctional mitochondria via mitophagy3,19. Global regulation of fission on the cellular level is insufficient to explain how fate decisions are made at the single organelle level, so it is unknown how those dual functions arise, blocking progress in developing therapies that target mitochondrial activity. However, systematically studying mitochondrial division to uncover fate determinants is challenging, since fission is unpredictable, and mitochondrial morphology is extremely heterogeneous. Furthermore, because their ultrastructure lies below the diffraction limit, the dynamic organization of mitochondria and their interaction partners are hard to study at the single organelle level. We used live-cell structured illumination microscopy (SIM) and instant SIM20 for fast multi-colour acquisition of mitochondrial dynamics in Cos-7 cells and mouse cardiomyocytes. We analysed hundreds of fission events, and discovered two functionally and mechanistically distinct types of fission. Mitochondria divide peripherally to shed damaged material into smaller daughter mitochondria that subsequently undergo mitophagy, whereas healthy mitochondria proliferate via midzone division. Both types are Drp1-mediated, but they rely on different membrane adaptors to recruit Drp1, and ER and actin mediated pre-constriction is only involved in midzone fission.

cell biology↗

bioRxiv2019

Mitochondrial RNA granules are fluid condensates, positioned by membrane dynamics

Mitochondria contain the genetic information and expression machinery to produce proteins essential for cellular respiration. Within the mitochondrial matrix, newly synthesized RNA, RNA processing proteins, and mitoribosome assembly factors are known to form punctate subcompartments referred to as mitochondrial RNA granules (MRGs) 1-3. Despite their proposed role in regulating gene expression, little is known about the structural and dynamic properties of MRGs. We investigated the organization of MRGs using fluorescence super-resolution localization microscopy and correlative electron microscopy techniques, obtaining ultrastructural details of their internal architecture. We find that MRGs are organized into nanoscale RNA cores surrounded by a protein shell. Using live-cell super-resolution structured illumination microscopy and photobleaching perturbations, we reveal that MRGs undergo fusion and rapidly exchange components, consistent with liquid-liquid phase separation (LLPS). Furthermore, MRGs associate with the inner mitochondrial membrane and their fusion coincides with membrane remodeling. Inhibition of mitochondrial fission leads to an aberrant distribution of MRGs into concentrated pockets, where they remain as distinct individual units despite their close apposition. Together, our results reveal a role for LLPS in concentrating RNA and its processing proteins into MRGs, which are positioned along mitochondria by membrane dynamics.

biophysics↗