Cytoplasmic protein granules organize kinase-mediated RAS signaling [article]

Asmin Tulpule, Juan Guan, Dana S Neel, Yone Phar Lin, Ann Heslin, Hannah Allegakoan, Shriya Perati, Alejandro D Ramirez, Xiaoyu Shi, Bin Yang, Siyu Feng, Bo Huang (+1 others)
2019 bioRxiv   pre-print
Understanding how cells spatially organize signaling events is important in normal biology and pathological conditions such as cancer. Here, we uncover a membraneless, protein granule-based subcellular structure that can organize receptor tyrosine kinase (RTK)-mediated RAS/MAPK pathway signaling, which is thought to occur exclusively from lipid-membrane compartments in mammalian cells. De-novo assembly of cytoplasmic protein granules by certain RTKs, including oncogenic gene fusions involving
more » ... K and RET, is dependent on multimerization domains in the RTK fusion partners. Protein granule formation is both necessary and sufficient to locally concentrate the RAS activating complex GRB2/SOS1 to initiate MAPK pathway signaling. Our findings reveal membraneless, higher-order protein assembly as a principle by which cells can organize kinase-mediated proliferative signals.
doi:10.1101/704312 fatcat:3ublwbkj4bg53el2rj6v2l3yby