University Daily Kansan
Friday, December 6. 1974
7
KU researchers study secrets of cell component
Bv PAULA.IOIJ.V
Renorter
One of the hottest areas of cell biology research in the world today is the study of microtubules, Paul R. Burton, chairman of the Biophysics, physiology and cell biology, said recently.
Burton and other University of Kansas researchers have been studying the secrets of this strange liquid.
Microtubules are elongated tubular structures composed of a protein called tubulin. They are found in all cells and are important in many cell functions, Burton said.
According to Burton, the mitotic apparatus—the system whereby a cell is able to divide—is made up of microtubules.
He said cancer was a mitotic disease, in which cells divided when they weren't supposed to.
"The cancerous cells have reverted to a sort of embryonic state, dividing like mad and crowding out normal cells," he said. "If we knew precisely how mitosis worked, we would take a giant step toward solving the cancer problem."
Microtubules also are involved in the nerve cell transport of proteins and enzymes, from the site of synthesis in the cell body to the end of the cell, Burton said.
Inside look
Inside the sperm cell of the parasitic flatworm, which lives inside the lung of the grass frog, exists microtubules which are associated with movement in the sperm. The picture of the microtubules was magnified 300,000 times with the use of an electron microscope.
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Some nerve cells are nearly a yard long, he said.
"We have a theory that microtubules serve as attachment points and guideways, while they act as actual moving," he said. "The microtubules serve as the railroad tracks along which the molecules move."
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Burton said the electron microscope was his major research tool.
"In the past two days, we have manipulated cells in probably half a dozen different ways," he said. "By next week we will be taking them at the electron microscope."
He said experimental manipulations included adding pressure, anti-leukemic drugs, anti-antibiotic drugs or any other combination which might add some knowledge of microtubules.
Burton said occasionally a researcher made a discovery or a series of discoveries of such magnitude that they added up to a Nobel Prize.
"If we make one small discovery from this effort, then it’s pretty good," he said. "There’s a lot of discoveries that keep you going."
"Cell biology is one of the most important areas of science now," he said. "Three Nobel Prizes were just awarded to cell biologists."
I. L. Houston, associate professor of biochemistry, is another KU microtubule researcher. He said he way trying to isolate lipids from them then study them in isolated systems.
"If we knew enough about how the cell controls microtubule assembly and functions, then we could start to talk about ways could control it by outside measures," he said.
"Is this a cause of the disease, or is this an effect of the disease?" he said. "If we knew something about that, we might be able to control it by some sort of outside agent."
There are some diseases in which microtubule structures aren't normal, like Cyclin D2.
Microtubules apparently are involved with granule release from cells, Houston said. Insulin is packaged in the cells of the pancreas as a granule, he said. It can be moved around in the cell, moved to the cell surface and then broken out of the cell. Microtubules are involved in this process, he said.
Houston said microtubules also were involved in giving shape to single-cell organisms and in the movement of these organisms. Microtubules are involved in the waving motions of flagella found on single-cell organisms, he said.
"It's only one set of tubulin molecules in
Women's Intercollegiate Swimming THE UNIVERSITY OF KANSAS Schedule 1974-75
Dec. 7 at University of Nebraska 2:00 p.m.
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Feb. 1 Kearney 5:30 p.m.
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the cell that can be diversified to do these various different tasks—releasing granules, dividing cells and so on." Houston said. "It's a very dynamic situation."
Houston said some researchers were growing hybrid microtubules by putting tubulin from a chick brain with axonemes from single-cell organisms. An axoneme is a central cylinder common to all cilia and flagella in single-cell organisms.
He said the chick-type microtubules were grown off the axonemes. This shows the great similarity in the structure of these cells. But they aren't from similar organisms, he said.
Both Burton and Houston said they studied microtubules mainly for reasons other than the practical application to disease cures.
"You usually don't start doing things from the point of view that you're going to control disease or anything like that," Houston said. "It's basic to understand any issue in a cellular function. In order to repair the cell, we have to understand how it works."
Houston said he had thought about starting a small commercial company to produce microchip-like devices.
"Some of the abstract art that can come out of these things is really fascinating," he said. "The symmetry of these things is just really fascinating."
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Burton said he was interested in satisfying his curiosity about how things are a way to find out how works in our environment and look at their component parts, he said.
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