Caveolin-1: separating its signaling activites from its caveolae organelle forming abilities

Caveolae（拉丁语为“小洞穴”）是在大多数哺乳动物细胞中发现的瓶状膜内陷。小泡蛋白-1是小泡的主要外壳蛋白，是形成小泡的显性蛋白；缺乏Caveolin-1基因的小鼠在所有非肌肉细胞中也缺乏小泡，这为Caveolin-1直接负责小泡的组装提供了直接证据。对微泡的研究表明，它们含有许多信号分子，现在人们普遍认为，微泡形成是最成熟的以三维方式分离和组织信号复合物的方法之一。洞穴研究的重要性使得洞穴研究的先驱之一迈克尔·利桑蒂博士在被引用次数最多的科学家中排名第13位。

Caveolae (Latin for 'small caves') are flask-shaped membrane invaginations found in most mammalian cells. Caveolin-1, the main coat protein of caveolae, is the dominant protein for the formation of caveolae; mice lacking the Caveolin-1 gene also lack caveolae in every non-muscle cells, providing direct evidence that Caveolin-1 is directly responsible for caveolae assembly. Study of caveolae show that they contain many signalling molecules, and it is now well accepted that caveolae formation is one of the most established approach to segregate and organize signalling complexes in a tri-dimensional manner. The importance of caveolae research is such that one of the pioneer of caveolae research, Dr. Michael Lisanti, is now the 13th most cited scientist of all time.