Gangliosides are transported from the plasma membrane to intralysosomal membranes as revealed by immuno-electron microscopy.
A biotin-labeled derivative of the ganglioside GM1 (biotin-GM1) was used to study its transport along the endocytic pathway of cultured fibroblasts by immuno-electron microscopy. Using electron dense endocytic tracers we could demonstrate that late endosomes and lysosomes of these cells are long living organelles with a high content of internal membranes. Our studies show that during endocytosis the biotin-GM1 was transported to these intraendosomal and intralysosomal membranes. These observations support the hypothesis that glycosphingolipids (GSL) are preferentially degraded in intralysosomal vesicles.
Möbius
W
W
Kekulé-Institute für Organische Chemie und Biochemie, Bonn, Germany.
Herzog
V
V
Sandhoff
K
K
Schwarzmann
G
G
D001692:Biological Transport; D001710:Biotin / Q000378:metabolism; D002240:Carbohydrate Sequence; D002462:Cell Membrane / Q000378:metabolism* / Q000648:ultrastructure; D002478:Cells, Cultured; D004705:Endocytosis; D005347:Fibroblasts / Q000378:metabolism / Q000648:ultrastructure; D005677:G(M1) Ganglioside / Q000378:metabolism*; D006801:Humans; D007425:Intracellular Membranes / Q000378:metabolism* / Q000648:ultrastructure; D008247:Lysosomes / Q000378:metabolism* / Q000648:ultrastructure; D016253:Microscopy, Immunoelectron / Q000379:methods*; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data
D005677:G(M1) Ganglioside; D001710:Biotin