POROSOME: A NEW ORGANELLE AND THE UNIVERSAL SECRETION MACHINE IN CELLS
I. L. Lazrishvili,1 M. G. Zhvania
I. S. Beritashvili Institute of Physiology, Tbilisi, Georgia;
1 e-mail: nukrilaz@gmail.com
A new cell organelle, porosome, discovered in the mid 1990’s and its demonstration as the universal secretory
machinery in cells is described. In contrast to the generally accepted belief that the secretory vesicle membrane
is totally incorporated into the plasma membrane during cell secretion, it has been shown that secretory vesicles
transiently dock and fuse with the porosome base via SNARE proteins to expel vesicular contents under
intravesicular pressure which is generated by active transport of water through water channels located at the secretory
vesicle membrane.
Key words: secretion, secretory vesicles, porosome, membrane proteins t-SNARE and v-SNARE
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