Single-Cell Quantification of the Transition Temperature of Intracellular Elastin-like Polypeptides. 2021

David R Tyrpak, and Yaocun Li, and Siqi Lei, and Hugo Avila, and John Andrew MacKay
Department of Pharmacology and Pharmaceutical Sciences, School of Pharmacy of the University of Southern California, 1985 Zonal Avenue, Los Angeles, California 90089, United States.

Elastin-like polypeptides (ELPs) are modular, stimuli-responsive materials that self-assemble into protein-rich microdomains in response to heating. By cloning ELPs to effector proteins, expressed intracellular fusions can even modulate cellular pathways. A critical step in engineering these fusions is to determine and control their intracellular phase transition temperature (Tt). To do so, this Method paper describes a simple live-cell imaging technique to estimate the Tt of non-fluorescent ELP fusion proteins by co-transfection with a fluorescent ELP marker. Intracellular microdomain formation can then be visualized in live cells through the co-assembly of the non-fluorescent and fluorescent ELP fusion proteins. If the two ELP fusions have different Tt, the intracellular ELP mixture phase separates at the temperature corresponding to the fusion with the lower Tt. In addition, co-assembled ELP microdomains often exhibit pronounced differences in size or number, compared to single transfected treatments. These features enable live-cell imaging experiments and image analysis to determine the intracellular Tt of a library of related ELP fusions. As a case study, we employ the recently reported Caveolin1-ELP library (CAV1-ELPs). In addition to providing a detailed protocol, we also report the development of a useful FIJI plugin named SIAL (Simple Image Analysis Library), which contains programs for image randomization and blinding, phenotype scoring, and ROI selection. These tasks are important parts of the protocol detailed here and are also commonly employed in other image analysis workflows.

UI MeSH Term Description Entries
D010455 Peptides Members of the class of compounds composed of AMINO ACIDS joined together by peptide bonds between adjacent amino acids into linear, branched or cyclical structures. OLIGOPEPTIDES are composed of approximately 2-12 amino acids. Polypeptides are composed of approximately 13 or more amino acids. PROTEINS are considered to be larger versions of peptides that can form into complex structures such as ENZYMES and RECEPTORS. Peptide,Polypeptide,Polypeptides
D004549 Elastin alpha-Elastin,kappa-Elastin,alpha Elastin,kappa Elastin
D013696 Temperature The property of objects that determines the direction of heat flow when they are placed in direct thermal contact. The temperature is the energy of microscopic motions (vibrational and translational) of the particles of atoms. Temperatures
D044366 Transition Temperature The temperature at which a substance changes from one state or conformation of matter to another. Temperature, Transition,Boiling Point Temperature,Freezing Point Temperature,Melting Point Temperature,Boiling Point Temperatures,Freezing Point Temperatures,Melting Point Temperatures,Temperature, Boiling Point,Temperature, Freezing Point,Temperature, Melting Point,Temperatures, Boiling Point,Temperatures, Freezing Point,Temperatures, Melting Point,Temperatures, Transition,Transition Temperatures
D044367 Phase Transition A change of a substance from one form or state to another. Gas-Liquid-Solid Phase Transitions,Sol-Gel Phase Transition,Gas Liquid Solid Phase Transitions,Gas-Liquid-Solid Phase Transition,Phase Transition, Gas-Liquid-Solid,Phase Transition, Sol-Gel,Phase Transitions,Phase Transitions, Gas-Liquid-Solid,Phase Transitions, Sol-Gel,Sol Gel Phase Transition,Sol-Gel Phase Transitions,Transition, Gas-Liquid-Solid Phase,Transition, Sol-Gel Phase,Transitions, Gas-Liquid-Solid Phase,Transitions, Sol-Gel Phase

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