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Abstract This review highlights recent literature on biomolecular condensates in plant development and discusses challenges for fully dissecting their functional roles. Plant developmental biology has been inundated with descriptive examples of biomolecular condensate formation, but it is only recently that mechanistic understanding has been forthcoming. Here, we discuss recent examples of potential roles biomolecular condensates play at different stages of the plant life cycle. We group these examples based on putative molecular functions, including sequestering interacting components, enhancing dwell time, and interacting with cytoplasmic biophysical properties in response to environmental change. We explore how these mechanisms could modulate plant development in response to environmental inputs and discuss challenges and opportunities for further research into deciphering molecular mechanisms to better understand the diverse roles that biomolecular condensates exert on life.
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Depicting a cellular space occupied by condensates
Condensates have emerged as a new way to understand how cells are orga- nized, and have been invoked to play crucial roles in essentially all cellular processes. In this view, the cell is occupied by numerous assemblies, each composed of member proteins and nucleic acids that preferentially interact with each other. However, available visual represen- tations of condensates fail to communicate the growing body of knowledge about how con- densates form and function. The resulting focus on only a subset of the potential implications of condensates can skew interpretations of results and hinder the generation of new hypoth- eses. Here we summarize the discussion from a workshop that brought together cell biolo- gists, visualization and computation specialists, and other experts who specialize in thinking about space and ways to represent it. We place the recent advances in condensate research in a historical perspective that describes evolving views of the cell; highlight different attri- butes of condensates that are not well-served by current visual conventions; and survey po- tential approaches to overcome these challenges. An important theme of these discussions is that the new understanding on the roles of condensates exposes broader challenges in visual representations that apply to cell biological research more generally.
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- Award ID(s):
- 2219605
- PAR ID:
- 10526835
- Editor(s):
- Kellogg, Douglas
- Publisher / Repository:
- Molecular Biology of the Cell
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Molecular Biology of the Cell
- Volume:
- 34
- Issue:
- 10
- ISSN:
- 1059-1524
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
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Accepted Manuscript1.0
- Journal Article:
- https://doi.org/10.1091/mbc.E22-11-0519
