RhoG helps an endothelial cell swaddle a leukocyte in membrane folds.

Infection and injury lure leukocytes from the bloodstream, but they first have to traverse a vessel wall to reach the traumatized tissue. As van Buul et al. show, the GTPase RhoG helps the cells make the crossing.

As leukocytes exit a blood vessel, they either pass right through the endothelial cells in the lining or wriggle between them. To get across this layer, a leukocyte first hooks onto the protruding protein ICAM1. An endothelial cell then puckers its membrane to produce a cup that cradles the leukocyte. The molecular events that prompt cup formation remain unclear. The endothelial structures resemble the phagocytic cups that allow cells to gobble pathogens. Because the GTPase RhoG spurs phagocytosis in certain cells, van Buul et al. wanted to determine whether the molecule also promotes construction of endothelial cups....

The Rockefeller University Press
2007
The Rockefeller University Press
2007
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