Lava lamps illustrating the concept of liquid-liquid phase separation (Image: M. Mozart / Flickr)
For more than 100 years, biologists have known that cells contain various kinds of membraneless organelles and conjectured what organizing principles underlie them. During the past decade, liquid-liquid phase separation has emerged as one of the concepts that can explain these cellular structures. Phase separation has become an increasingly hot topic, as it can be related to pathologies such as neurodegenerative diseases. Thus, understanding the mechanisms underlying phase separation and their regulation is an important goal. In a study published , Makoto Saito from the Matthias group and collaborators showed for the first time that acetylation regulates liquid-liquid phase separation in a spatio-temporal manner. At time of discovery about 10 years ago, the process called liquid-liquid phase separation was hailed as a new paradigm in cell biology: the contents of cells can separate into droplets, like oil in water. This means that biomolecular condensates - such as stress granules or nucleoli - are actually liquid droplets that form in the cytoplasm when certain molecules concentrate and others get excluded.
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