Neural Control of Proteolysis in Specific Muscle Cells

这个项目的目的是确定来自神经细胞的信号如何控制肌肉中细胞蛋白质的降解。实验对象是一种小型线虫，线虫，它的神经和肌肉系统相对简单。这种生物还有利于简单快速的基因实验。为了观察蛋白质的降解，我们将一种来自细菌(大肠杆菌)的外来基因引入蠕虫，这样就可以很容易地通过生化和免疫化学方法追踪这种蛋白质的命运。我们的目标是使用影响神经或肌肉功能的突变体来确定神经与肌肉的直接连接和/或神经和肌肉之间的化学信号如何影响肌肉细胞内蛋白质的分解速度。

The purpose of this project is to determine how signals from nerve cells control the degradation of cellular proteins in muscle. The experimental subject is a small roundworm, Caenorhabditis elegans, that has a relatively simple system of nerves and muscles. This organism is also conducive to simple and rapid genetic experiments. To observe protein degradation, we have introduced a foreign gene from a bacterium (E. coli) into the worm so that the fate of this protein can be easily followed by biochemical and immunochemical methods. Our objective is to use mutants that affect the function of nerves or muscles to determine how direct nerve-to-muscle connections and/or chemical signaling between nerves and muscles affects the rate of protein breakdown inside muscle cells.