In one project, we focused on the actin-related mechanisms regulating CTL secretion as they modulate serial killing during immune responses. CD8+cytotoxic T lymphocytes (CTLs) eliminate virally infected cells through directed secretion of specialized lytic granules. Because a single CTL can kill multiple targets, degranulation must be tightly regulated. However, how CTLs regulate the termination of granule secretion remains unclear. Previous work demonstrated that centralized actin reduction at the immune synapse precedes degranulation. Using a combination of live confocal, total internal reflection fluorescence, and superresolution microscopy, we demonstrated that, after granule fusion, actin recovers at the synapse and no further secretion is observed. Depolymerization of actin led to resumed granule secretion, suggesting that recovered actin acts as a barrier preventing sustained degranulation. RAB27a-deficient CTLs, which do not secrete cytotoxic granules, failed to recover actin at the synapse, suggesting that RAB27a-mediated granule secretion is required for actin recovery. Finally, we found that both actin clearance and recovery correlated with synaptic phosphatidylinositol 4,5-bisphosphate (PIP2) and that alterations in PIP2at the immunological synapse regulated cortical actin in CTLs, providing a potential mechanism through which CTLs control cortical actin density. In a second project, we presented a systems-level analysis of the organelle interactome using a multispectral image acquisition method that overcomes the challenge of spectral overlap in the fluorescent protein palette. We used confocal and lattice light sheet instrumentation and an imaging informatics pipeline of five steps to achieve mapping of organelle numbers, volumes, speeds, positions and dynamic inter-organelle contacts in live cells from a monkey fibroblast cell line. We described the frequency and locality of two-, three-, four- and five-way interactions among six different membrane-bound organelles (endoplasmic reticulum, Golgi, lysosome, peroxisome, mitochondria and lipid droplet) and showed how these relationships change over time. We demonstrated that each organelle has a characteristic distribution and dispersion pattern in three-dimensional space and that there is a reproducible pattern of contacts among the six organelles, that is affected by microtubule and cell nutrient status. This methodology offers a powerful descriptive tool and can be used to develop hypotheses about cellular organization and dynamics. In a third project, we investigated the cell signaling and organellar mechanisms underlying dietary restrictions role in enhancing organismal longevity. We demonstrated that to permit long-term survival in response to sudden glucose depletion, yeast cells activate lipid-droplet (LD) consumption through micro-lipophagy (-lipophagy). AMP-activated protein kinase (AMPK) activation triggered this pathway, which required Atg14p. More gradual glucose starvation, amino acid deprivation or rapamycin did not trigger -lipophagy and failed to provide the needed substitute energy source for long-term survival. During acute glucose restriction, activated AMPK was stabilized from degradation and interacted with Atg14p. This prompted Atg14p redistribution from ER exit sites onto liquid-ordered vacuole membrane domains, initiating -lipophagy. These findings are relevant for studies on aging and evolutionary survival strategies of different organisms. In a fourth project, we used emerging superresolution imaging technologies to clarify the morphology and dynamics of the peripheral ER, which contacts and modulates most other intracellular organelles. Peripheral components of the ER have classically been described as comprising both tubules and flat sheets. We showed that this system consists almost exclusively of tubules at varying densities, including structures that we termed ER matrices. Conventional optical imaging technologies had led to misidentification of these structures as sheets because of the dense clustering of tubular junctions and a previously uncharacterized rapid form of ER motion. Our demonstration of the existence of ER matrices explains previous confounding evidence that had indicated the occurrence of ER sheet proliferation after overexpression of tubular junction-forming proteins.

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24
Fiscal Year
2017
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Name
U.S. National Inst/Child Hlth/Human Dev
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Waxse, Bennett J; Sengupta, Prabuddha; Hesketh, Geoffrey G et al. (2017) Myosin VI facilitates connexin 43 gap junction accretion. J Cell Sci 130:827-840
Seo, Arnold Y; Lau, Pick-Wei; Feliciano, Daniel et al. (2017) AMPK and vacuole-associated Atg14p orchestrate ?-lipophagy for energy production and long-term survival under glucose starvation. Elife 6:
Ritter, Alex T; Kapnick, Senta M; Murugesan, Sricharan et al. (2017) Cortical actin recovery at the immunological synapse leads to termination of lytic granule secretion in cytotoxic T lymphocytes. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 114:E6585-E6594
Valm, Alex M; Cohen, Sarah; Legant, Wesley R et al. (2017) Applying systems-level spectral imaging and analysis to reveal the organelle interactome. Nature 546:162-167
Sulkowski, Mikolaj J; Han, Tae Hee; Ott, Carolyn et al. (2016) A Novel, Noncanonical BMP Pathway Modulates Synapse Maturation at the Drosophila Neuromuscular Junction. PLoS Genet 12:e1005810
Nixon-Abell, Jonathon; Obara, Christopher J; Weigel, Aubrey V et al. (2016) Increased spatiotemporal resolution reveals highly dynamic dense tubular matrices in the peripheral ER. Science 354:
Battle, Christopher; Ott, Carolyn M; Burnette, Dylan T et al. (2015) Intracellular and extracellular forces drive primary cilia movement. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 112:1410-5
Manor, Uri; Bartholomew, Sadie; Golani, Gonen et al. (2015) A mitochondria-anchored isoform of the actin-nucleating spire protein regulates mitochondrial division. Elife 4:
Rambold, Angelika S; Cohen, Sarah; Lippincott-Schwartz, Jennifer (2015) Fatty acid trafficking in starved cells: regulation by lipid droplet lipolysis, autophagy, and mitochondrial fusion dynamics. Dev Cell 32:678-92
Ritter, Alex T; Asano, Yukako; Stinchcombe, Jane C et al. (2015) Actin depletion initiates events leading to granule secretion at the immunological synapse. Immunity 42:864-76

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