Huang Yan, Chen Haixu, Qiao Xin, Li Shangsong, Wang Xiaoliang, Liu Xiaoman, Huang Xin
State Key Laboratory of Advanced Inorganic Fibers and Composites, School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin, 150001, China.
Nat Commun. 2025 Jun 5;16(1):5231. doi: 10.1038/s41467-025-60541-7.
Stress stimulation-mediated liquid-liquid phase separation is a key activity in living organisms, but its biophysical characteristics are poorly understood. Here, we report a UV-light stress stimulation behaviour in a binary community of synthetic protocells of condensates and proteinosomes, showing that condensates could behave like Condensate Pumps to enable a stepwise controlled transmembrane mass transfer regardless of the permeability barrier of proteinosomes. The stimulation mechanism of interfacial tension-induced proteinosome deformation and transient high osmotic pressure arisen by the dissociation of condensate is proposed. Accordingly, under UV-light stress stimulation, unexpected characteristics could be triggered by transmembrane pumping oversized biomacromolecules into proteinosomes including liquid-liquid reentrant phase separation, DNA unwinding, and protein synthesis. Therefore, our results not only reveal unique physical principles and potential characteristics of macromolecular assemblies at droplet-membrane interface but also highlight a pathway for transmembrane transport of biomacromolecules which is anticipated to serve as a powerful technique to inducing higher-order behaviour in synthetic protocells community.
应激刺激介导的液-液相分离是生物体中的一项关键活动，但其生物物理特性却知之甚少。在此，我们报道了一种在凝聚物和蛋白质体的合成原始细胞二元群落中的紫外线应激刺激行为，表明凝聚物的行为类似于凝聚物泵，能够实现逐步可控的跨膜质量转移，而不受蛋白质体渗透屏障的影响。我们提出了界面张力诱导蛋白质体变形以及凝聚物解离产生瞬时高渗透压的刺激机制。据此，在紫外线应激刺激下，通过将超大生物大分子跨膜泵入蛋白质体可引发意想不到的特性，包括液-液折返相分离、DNA解旋和蛋白质合成。因此，我们的结果不仅揭示了液滴-膜界面处大分子组装体独特的物理原理和潜在特性，还突出了生物大分子跨膜运输的一条途径，有望成为在合成原始细胞群落中诱导高阶行为的有力技术。
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