Changes in membrane lipid composition cause alterations in epithelial cell-cell adhesion structures in renal papillary collecting duct cells.

María Gabriela Márquez, Nicolás Octavio Favale, Francisco Leocata Nieto, Lucila Gisele Pescio, Norma Sterin-Speziale

Universidad Nacional de La Rioja, La Rioja, Argentina. g_marquez@uolsinectis.com.ar

Biochimica et biophysica acta 2012 Mar

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In epithelial tissues, adherens junctions (AJ) mediate cell-cell adhesion by using proteins called E-cadherins, which span the plasma membrane, contact E-cadherin on other cells and connect with the actin cytoskeleton inside the cell. Although AJ protein complexes are inserted in detergent-resistant membrane microdomains, the influence of membrane lipid composition in the preservation of AJ structures has not been extensively addressed. In the present work, we studied the contribution of membrane lipids to the preservation of renal epithelial cell-cell adhesion structures. We biochemically characterized the lipid composition of membranes containing AJ complexes. By using lipid membrane-affecting agents, we found that such agents induced the formation of new AJ protein-containing domains of different lipid composition. By using both biochemical approaches and fluorescence microscopy we demonstrated that the membrane phospholipid composition plays an essential role in the in vivo maintenance of AJ structures involved in cell-cell adhesion structures in renal papillary collecting duct cells. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Citation

María Gabriela Márquez, Nicolás Octavio Favale, Francisco Leocata Nieto, Lucila Gisele Pescio, Norma Sterin-Speziale. Changes in membrane lipid composition cause alterations in epithelial cell-cell adhesion structures in renal papillary collecting duct cells. Biochimica et biophysica acta. 2012 Mar;1818(3):491-501