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Abstract

Biomolecular phase separation has emerged as a new paradigm in life sciences, attracting attention from the principles of non-membranous organelle formation to the elucidation of disease mechanisms and therapeutic applications. In this talk, I will present studies that combine soft-matter physics–based theory with light-controlled techniques to explore the physical mechanisms of condensate formation and the material properties of these droplets in living cells [1–4]. Extending these analyses to condensates formed at synaptic membranes, called the presynaptic active zone, we further demonstrate that these regions harbor periodic nanostructures inside the condensates, arising from the microphase separation of protein block copolymers, revealed by super-resolution imaging and elucidated through theoretical analysis [5]. These findings suggest that microphase separation of protein block copolymers can be positioned as a general principle for designing functional nanostructures in living systems, opening avenues for synaptic engineering and bio-nanomaterial applications.

[RECENT PUBLICATIONS]
1. Shunsuke F. Shimobayashi, Pierre Ronceray, David W. Sanders, Mikko P. Haataja, Clifford P. Brangwynne, Nature, 599(7885) 503-506 (2021)
2. Ming-Tzo Wei, Yi-Che Chang, Shunsuke F. Shimobayashi, Yongdae Shin, Amy R. Strom, Clifford P. Brangwynne, Nat. Cell Biol., 22(10) 1187-1196 (2020)
3. Masataka Yanagawa, Shunsuke F Shimobayashi, The Journal of Biochemistry (Invited Review) , mvad095 (2023).
4. Shunsuke F. Shimobayashi, Kota Konishi, Paul J. Ackerman, Takashi Taniguchi, Clifford P. Brangwynne,
bioRxiv, doi: 10.1101/2023.10.29.564316 (2023)
5. Hirokazu Sakamoto and Shunsuke F. Shimobayashi, submitted (2025).