The influenza viral membrane protein hemagglutinin (HA) is required at high concentrations on virion and host-cell membranes for infectivity. Because the role of actin in membrane organization is not completely understood, we quantified the relationship between HA and host-cell actin at the nanoscale. Results obtained using superresolution fluorescence photoactivation localization microscopy (FPALM) in nonpolarized cells show that HA clusters colocalize with actin-rich membrane regions (ARMRs). Individual molecular trajectories in live cells indicate restricted HA mobility in ARMRs, and actin disruption caused specific changes to HA clustering. Surprisingly, the actin-binding protein cofilin was excluded from some regions within several hundred nanometers of HA clusters, suggesting that HA clusters or adjacent proteins within the same clusters influence local actin structure. Thus, with the use of imaging, we demonstrate a dynamic relationship between glycoprotein membrane organization and the actin cytoskeleton at the nanoscale.

Localization microscopy can image nanoscale cellular details. To address biological questions, the ability to distinguish multiple molecular species simultaneously is invaluable. Here, we present a new version of fluorescence photoactivation localization microscopy (FPALM) which detects the emission spectrum of each localized molecule, and can quantify changes in emission spectrum of individual molecules over time. This information can allow for a dramatic increase in the number of different species simultaneously imaged in a sample, and can create super-resolution maps showing how single molecule emission spectra vary with position and time in a sample.

The lipid phosphatidylinositol 4,5-bisphosphate (PIP2) forms nanoscopic clusters in cell plasma membranes; however, the processes determining PIP2 mobility and thus its spatial patterns are not fully understood. Using super-resolution imaging of living cells, we find that PIP2 is tightly colocalized with and modulated by overexpression of the influenza viral protein hemagglutinin (HA). Within and near clusters, HA and PIP2 follow a similar spatial dependence, which can be described by an HA-dependent potential gradient; PIP2 molecules move as if they are attracted to the center of clusters by a radial force of 0.079 5 0.002 pN in HAb2 cells. The measured clustering and dynamics of PIP2 are inconsistent with the unmodified forms of the raft, tether, and fence models. Rather, we found that the spatial PIP2 distributions and how they change in time are explained via a novel, to our knowledge, dynamic mechanism: a radial gradient of PIP2 binding sites that are themselves mobile. This model may be useful for understanding other biological membrane domains whose distributions display gradients in density while maintaining their mobility.

No abstract

No abstract