SFB1551 Project: R13

Project Title: Pronuclei as a Platform to Study Phase Behavior and Biological Function of Arginine/Glycine-Rich Proteins

Summary: The FUS protein (fused in sarcoma) is part of the pathology in ALS (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis) and FTD (frontotemporal dementia) diseases. A defective transport mechanism of FUS to the cell nucleus causes phase separation of the protein in cytoplasm of nerve cells. Since our proto-nucleus platform provides a similarly crowded nucleic acid environment as the cell nucleus, we use it to study the mechanisms of FUS phase separation in vitro.