Active Cells, Biochemistry & Physiology Chemistry

Condensates at Membrane Scaffolds - Integrated Systems as Synthetic Cell Compartments (ComeInCell)

Funder UKRI
Recipient organisation University of Cambridge
Funding £268K
Period Feb 2025 — Jan 2029

In plain English

AI plain-English summary

Scientists are building synthetic cells from scratch—tiny, tailor-made vesicles that mimic real cellular compartments—to study how protein droplets called condensates interact with membranes. This matters because membrane-condensate interactions are central to how cells transport materials, reshape themselves, run metabolic networks, and repair damage. When these interactions go wrong, disease can follow. But studying them inside living cells is messy: too many variables, too hard to isolate cause from effect. Synthetic cells offer a clean, controllable platform to untangle these mechanisms. If the project succeeds, it will deliver a standardised, cost-effective prototyping system for drug development and therapeutics. Pharmaceutical companies could test how drugs affect membrane transport or condensate assembly without animal models or complex cell cultures. The platform could also support green chemistry applications—for example, engineering synthetic cells to produce valuable compounds efficiently. The project is fundamentally curiosity-driven, rooted in fundamental science about how cells organise themselves. But similar fundamental work on membrane biophysics and phase separation has already reshaped our understanding of neurodegenerative diseases and opened new avenues for drug design. Deeper knowledge of how condensates and membranes coordinate could eventually lead to entirely new classes of therapies targeting these interactions.

View original technical description
ComeInCell will establish a novel integrated Synthetic Cell platform to provide cost- and resource-efficient, environmentally friendly, widely applicable and quantitative model systems to elucidate key cellular mechanisms of health and disease based on the integration of condensate and membrane models. Understanding membrane-condensate interactions is vital for deciphering their functional roles in cellular processes. Our consortium employs synthetic vesicles as model systems to explore these interactions. These tailor-made mimics of cellular compartments offer a platform for studying membrane dynamics and the impact of compartmentalization on the activity of reaction networks and the assembly of complex machinery. We will design synthetic cells as life-science prototyping tools to decipher the role of membrane-associated condensates in essential cellular processes linked to membrane transport, membrane transformation, metabolic networks, and repair. The network will confront global challenges, providing solutions in drug development, therapeutics, green-related issues, and synthetic biology. Our goal is to equip junior scientists with cross-disciplinary expertise for developing integrated synthetic cellular testbeds encompassing condensates and membranes, revolutionizing prototyping systems. We will train the next generation of biophysicists, biochemists and bioengineers in rigorous quantitative and mechanistic thinking, while establishing strong ties to young and emerging European SMEs in the health sector for efficient dissemination towards new therapies

View the original record at the funder ↗

Researchers

Lorenzo Di Michele (Principal Investigator)

Related Research

Grants with similar aims, by meaning.

Condensates at Membrane Scaffolds – Integrated Systems as Synthetic Cell Compartments
Engineering novel cell mimetic membrane architectures
Mass transport in biomimetic lipid membrane networks created by light
BBSRC-NSF/BIO - Deciphering the rules of nucleus architecture with synthetic cells and organelles
Supported Cell Membranes: The next level in model membrane systems

Original classification

Training Grant

Plain English summaries and category classifications on this site are generated by AI and may not perfectly reflect the original research.