Physiological role of insulin granule docking in regulated exocytosis

2014 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 25893025
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Research Activity Start-up
• Allocation Type: Single-year Grants
• Research Field: General medical chemistry
• Research Institution: Gunma University
• Principal Investigator: MIZUNO kouichi 群馬大学, 生体調節研究所, 助教 (30321821)
• Project Period (FY): 2013-08-30 – 2015-03-31
• Keywords: インスリン分泌 / 糖尿病 / Rab27a / 全反射顕微鏡

Outline of Final Research Achievements

We directly observed insulin granule docking and fusion in pancreatic beta cell under total internal reflection fluorescence microscopy to figure out the physiological role of insulin granule docking in regulated exocytosis. This observation revealed that docked granules show lower fusion provability than that of undocked granules and they fuse with the dissociation of docking factor, granuphilin by recruiting a priming factor, Munc13-4 after fusion stimuli. These results suggest that docked granules might be trapped in a muted state, which opposites to a current model of regulated exocytosis that docked granules preferably fuse after fusion stimuli.

Free Research Field

細胞生物学