Department of Biology, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Panepistimioupolis 15784, Athens, Greece.
Trends Genet. 2016 Sep;32(9):576-590. doi: 10.1016/j.tig.2016.06.003. Epub 2016 Jul 15.
Transporters are transmembrane proteins mediating the selective uptake or efflux of solutes, metabolites, drugs, or ions across cellular membranes. Despite their immense biological importance in cell nutrition, communication, signaling, and homeostasis, their study remains technically difficult mostly due to their lipid-embedded nature. The study of eukaryotic transporters presents additional complexity due to multiple subcellular control mechanisms that operate to ensure proper membrane traffic, membrane localization, and turnover. Model fungi present unique genetic tools to study eukaryotic transporter function. This review highlights how fungal transporter genetics combined with new methodologies for assaying their cellular expression and function as well as recent structural approaches have led to the functional dissection of selected transporter paradigms in Aspergillus nidulans.
转运蛋白是介导溶质、代谢物、药物或离子跨细胞膜选择性摄取或外排的跨膜蛋白。尽管它们在细胞营养、通讯、信号传递和动态平衡方面具有巨大的生物学重要性，但由于它们的脂质嵌入性质，它们的研究仍然具有技术难度。真核转运蛋白的研究由于存在多种亚细胞控制机制而变得更加复杂，这些机制的作用是确保适当的膜运输、膜定位和周转。模式真菌提供了独特的遗传工具来研究真核转运蛋白的功能。本综述强调了真菌转运蛋白遗传学如何与评估其细胞表达和功能的新方法以及最近的结构方法相结合，从而导致对 Aspergillus nidulans 中选定转运蛋白范例的功能剖析。
