The never-before-seen organelle serves as a recycling center for cellular cargo, evidence suggests.
Even after decades of peering into cells, biologists are still finding surprises.
In a twist, researchers at the University of Virginia and the National Institutes of Health uncovered a new organelle, dubbed the hemifusome. This tiny membrane-bound structure serves as a cellular recycling center and may hold the key to treating several genetic diseases. The research has been published in Nature Communications.
“This is like discovering a new recycling center inside the cell,” co-author Seham Ebrahim, a biophysicist at the University of Virginia, said in a statement. “We think the hemifusome helps manage how cells package and process material, and when this process goes awry, it may contribute to diseases that affect many systems in the body.
