Diverse cellular signaling events, including B cell receptor (BCR) activation, are hypothesized to be facilitated by domains enriched in specific plasma membrane lipids and proteins that resemble liquid-ordered phase-separated domains in model membranes. This concept remains controversial and lacks direct experimental support in intact cells. Here, we visualize ordered and disordered domains in mouse B lymphoma cell membranes using super-resolution fluorescence localization microscopy, demonstrate that clustered BCR resides within ordered phase-like domains capable of sorting key regulators of BCR activation, and present a minimal, predictive model where clustering receptors leads to their collective activation by stabilizing an extended ordered domain. These results provide evidence for the role of membrane domains in BCR signaling and a plausible mechanism of BCR activation via receptor clustering that could be generalized to other signaling pathways. Overall, these studies demonstrate that lipid mediated forces can bias biochemical networks in ways that broadly impact signal transduction.DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.19891.001

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The extracellular senile plaques prevalent in brain tissue in Alzheimer's disease (AD) are composed of amyloid fibrils formed by the Aβ peptide. These fibrils have been traditionally believed to feature in neurotoxicity; however, numerous recent studies provide evidence that cytotoxicity in AD may be associated with low molecular weight oligomers of Aβ that associate with neuronal membranes and may lead to membrane permeabilization and disruption of the ion balance in the cell. The underlying mechanism leading to disruption of the membrane is the subject of many recent studies. Here we report the application of single molecule optical detection, using fluorescently labeled human Aβ40, combined with membrane conductivity measurements, to monitor the interaction of single oligomeric peptide structures with model planar black lipid membranes (BLM). In a qualitative study, we show that the binding of Aβ to the membrane can be described by three distinctly different behaviors, depending on the Aβ monomer concentration. For concentrations much below 10 nM, there is uniform binding of monomers over the surface of the membrane with no evidence of oligomer formation or membrane permeabilization. Between 10 nM and a few 100 nM, the uniform monomer binding is accompanied by the presence of peptide species ranging from dimers to small oligomers. The dimers are not found to permeabilize the membrane but the larger oligomers lead to permeabilization with individual oligomers producing ion conductances of less than 10 pS/pore. At higher concentration, perhaps beyond physiologically relevant concentrations, larger extended and dynamic structures are found with large conductance (100's of pS) suggesting major disruption of the membrane. KeywordsAβ; amyloid; single molecule; pore; electrophysiology; permeability One of the hallmarks of Alzheimer's disease (AD) is the formation of insoluble neurofibrillary tangles and senile plaques in brain tissue. The major component of these proteinaceous plaques is the 39-43 amino acid Aβ peptide, derived by proteolytic cleavage of the membrane spanning amyloid precursor protein (APP). The mechanism that underlies the pathogenicity of Aβ towards neuronal tissue is the subject of intense research.In vitro studies of Aβ reveal that in aqueous solution the peptide progressively associates from its monomeric form via low molecular weight species to extended β-sheet fibrils, a process NIH Public Access Author ManuscriptBiochemistry. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2011 April 13. Published in final edited form as:Biochemistry. 2010 April 13; 49(14): 3031-3039. doi:10.1021/bi901444w. NIH-PA Author ManuscriptNIH-PA Author Manuscript NIH-PA Author Manuscript that is highly dependent upon experimental conditions (1,2). It was originally assumed that Aβ becomes cytotoxic when it forms these large insoluble fibrillar aggregates (3,4), historically referred to as the amyloid hypothesis. For the purposes of this paper we use the term cytotoxic, to mean that Aβ causes deviations from the cell's ...

Understanding how amyloid-β peptide interacts with living cells on a molecular level is critical to development of targeted treatments for Alzheimer's disease. Evidence that oligomeric Aβ interacts with neuronal cell membranes has been provided, but the mechanism by which membrane binding occurs and the exact stoichiometry of the neurotoxic aggregates remain elusive. Physiologically relevant experimentation is hindered by the high Aβ concentrations required for most biochemical analyses, the metastable nature of Aβ aggregates, and the complex variety of Aβ species present under physiological conditions. Here we use single molecule microscopy to overcome these challenges, presenting direct optical evidence that small Aβ(1-40) oligomers bind to living neuroblastoma cells at physiological Aβ concentrations. Single particle fluorescence intensity measurements indicate that cell-bound Aβ species range in size from monomers to hexamers and greater, with the majority of bound oligomers falling in the dimer-to-tetramer range. Furthermore, while low-molecular weight oligomeric species do form in solution, the membrane-bound oligomer size distribution is shifted towards larger aggregates, indicating either that bound Aβ oligomers can rapidly increase in size or that these oligomers cluster at specific sites on the membrane. Calcium indicator studies demonstrate that small oligomer binding at physiological concentrations induces only mild, sporadic calcium leakage. These findings support the hypothesis that small oligomers are the primary Aβ species that interact with neurons at physiological concentrations.

Cells can alter the lipid content of their plasma membranes upon changes in their environment to maintain and adjust membrane function. Recent work suggests that some membrane functions arise because cellular plasma membranes are poised close to a miscibility transition under growth conditions. Here we report experiments utilizing giant plasma membrane vesicles (GPMVs) to explore how membrane transition temperature varies with growth temperature in a zebrafish cell line (ZF4) that can be adapted for growth between 20 and 32°C. We find that GPMV transition temperatures adjust to be 16.7 ± 1.2°C below growth temperature for four growth temperatures investigated and that adjustment occurs over roughly 2 days when temperature is abruptly lowered from 28 to 20°C. We also find that GPMVs have slightly different lipidomes when isolated from cells adapted for growth at 28 and 20°C. Similar to past work in vesicles derived from mammalian cells, fluctuating domains are observed in ZF4-derived GPMVs, consistent with their having critical membrane compositions. Taken together, these experimental results suggest that cells in culture biologically tune their membrane composition in a way that maintains specific proximity to a critical miscibility transition.

Soluble oligomers of the amyloid-β peptide have been implicated as proximal neurotoxins in Alzheimer's disease. However, the identity of the neurotoxic aggregate(s) and the mechanisms by which these species induce neuronal dysfunction remain uncertain. Physiologically relevant experimentation is hindered by the low endogenous concentrations of the peptide, the metastability of Aβ oligomers, and the wide range of observed interactions between Aβ and biological membranes. Single-molecule microscopy represents one avenue for overcoming these challenges. Using this technique, we find that Aβ binds to primary rat hippocampal neurons at physiological concentrations. Although amyloid-β(1-40) as well as amyloid-β(1-42) initially form larger oligomers on neurites than on glass slides, a 1:1 mix of the two peptides result in smaller neurite-bound oligomers than those detected on-slide or for either peptide alone. With 1 nM peptide in solution, Aβ40 oligomers do not grow over the course of 48 h, Aβ42 oligomers grow slightly, and oligomers of a 1:1 mix grow substantially. Evidently, small Aβ oligomers are capable of binding to neurons at physiological concentrations and grow at rates dependent on local Aβ42:Aβ40 ratios. These results are intriguing in light of the increased Aβ42:Aβ40 ratios shown to correlate with familial Alzheimer's disease mutations.

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The room-temperature tryptophan (Trp) phosphorescence lifetime is sensitive to details of the local environment and has been shown to increase significantly in some proteins following H-D exchange. Careful analysis of the phosphorescence lifetime distribution of Trp 109 in Escherichia coli alkaline phosphatase (AP) in solution as a function of time during the H-D exchange shows that this process corresponds to a two-state reaction resulting from the deuteration of a single, specific hydrogen in the core of the protein. The absence of a pH dependence of the exchange rate suggests that the exchange is not an EX2 process, and therefore, a certain degree of unfolding is required for exchange to occur. This discovery opens up the use of phosphorescence-detected hydrogen exchange as a sensitive tool for monitoring the local susceptibility and activation energy for exchange in proteins having a phosphorescent Trp and, for example, for studying the effects of local mutations upon that susceptibility.