Water reabsorption by organs such as the mammalian kidney and insect Malpighian tubule/hindgut requires a region of hypertonicity within the organ. To balance the high extracellular osmolarity, cells within these regions accumulate small organic molecules called osmolytes. These osmolytes can accumulate to a high level without toxic effects on cellular processes. Here we provide evidence consis...

The potential of spermatozoa to become motile during post-testicular maturation, and the relationship between the cytoplasmic droplet and fertilizing capacity are reviewed. Post-testicular maturation of spermatozoa involves the autonomous induction of motility, which can occur in vivo in testes with occluded excurrent ducts and in vitro in testicular explants, and artefactual changes in morphol...

Salinity stress challenges agriculture and food security globally. Upon salt stress, plant growth slows down, nutrients are recycled, osmolytes are produced, and reallocation of Na+ takes place. Since autophagy is a high-throughput degradation pathway that contributes to nutrient remobilization in plants, we explored the involvement of autophagic flux in salt stress response of Arabidopsis with...

It is currently the consensus belief that protective osmolytes such as trimethylamine N-oxide (TMAO) favor protein folding by being excluded from the vicinity of a protein, whereas denaturing osmolytes such as urea lead to protein unfolding by strongly binding to the surface. Despite there being consensus on how TMAO and urea affect proteins as a whole, very little is known as to their effects ...

Small organic molecules termed osmolytes are harnessed by a variety of cell types in a wide range of organisms to counter unfavorable physiological conditions that challenge protein stability and function. Using a well characterized reporter system that we developed to allow in vivo observations, we have explored how the osmolyte proline influences the stability and aggregation of a model aggre...

In response to swelling, mammalian cells release chloride and organic osmolytes through volume-regulated anion channels (VRACs). VRACs are heteromers of LRRC8A and other LRRC8 isoforms (LRRC8B to LRRC8E), which are co-expressed in HEK293 and most other cells. The spectrum of VRAC substrates and its dependence on particular LRRC8 isoforms remains largely unknown. We show that, besides the osmoly...