Abstract
Organelle movement and interaction are dynamic processes. Interpreting the functional role and mechanistic detail of interactions at membrane contact sites requires careful quantification of parameters such as duration, frequency, proximity, and surface area of contact, and identification of molecular components. We provide an overview of current methods used to quantify organelle interactions in plants and other organisms and propose novel applications of existing technologies to tackle this emerging topic in plant cell biology.
Highlights
Membrane contact sites (MCS) are regions at which transient, physical interactions between organelles occur
We review established techniques for characterizing plant MCS and their protein components, as well as methods that have only been used in non-plant systems to date
It is widely reported that interacting organelles reside within 10–30 nm of one another (Figure 1A), tethering over distances up to 300 nm has been reported between mitochondria and the plasma membrane in yeast cells (Klecker et al, 2013; Scorrano et al, 2019)
Summary
Membrane contact sites (MCS) are regions at which transient, physical interactions between organelles occur. Direct molecular exchanges between organelles may alternatively be carried out by vesicle-mediated delivery (Scorrano et al, 2019) or by transient interaction between organelles of the same type (e.g., “kiss and run” in mitochondria, Liu et al, 2009). These processes involve the fusion of membranes and are distinct from transient tethering at MCS, which by definition does not involve membrane fusion. For a review of the role of lipids in interactions at MCS, see Petit et al (2019)
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