Duan La
M3
Duan Lab
Human Aging Research Institute
Nanchang University
ABOUT US
A Young Group Doing Sphingolipids and Aging Research
Sphingolipids are essential to human health not only because of their bio-activities but also because of their critical structure roles for the plasma membrane and other subcellular organelles. Our work would contribute to insights into the roles of sphingolipids during aging.
We are focusing on exogenous-endogenous sphingolipids interactions and sphingolipids-protein interactions. Exogenous sphingolipids from foods or drugs (such as atypical 1-deoxy-sphingolipids) could be absorbed thus to participate in the synthesis and metabolism of endogenous sphingolipids, therefore, potentially effect on the plasma membrane.
The most popular and powerful tool for analyzing sphingolipids is the "state-of-the-art" mass spectrometry methods, so-called sphingolipidomics. Whereas other methods of studying lipids are somehow limited compared with nucleic acids and proteins. Because the lipids are not directly encoded by DNA, there is a restriction on the application of the molecular biological methods. We are trying to approach sphingolipids in two ways: 1) regulating the enzymes that control their metabolism, and 2) analyzing the membrane proteins (such as ion channels and G protein-coupled receptors) they may interact with.
We are studying sphingolipids and their metabolism in physiology and diseases by integrating sphingolipidomics, molecular biological and electron microscopy techniques. One of our strategies is to physically capture the lipids by single partial cryo-EM with binding membrane proteins; another adaption is identifying the localized sites of labeled sphingolipids on the plasma membrane by EM.
Sphingolipids are essential to the plasma membrane and working with transmembrane proteins such as S1P receptors. Exogenous sphingolipids and their analogs could affect endogenous sphingolipids.
Atypical sphingolipids are lack of an OH group in C1 thus could not be phosphorylated or glycosylated as complex sphingolipids. Our novel LC-MS/MS method for quantification atypical and traditional sphingolipids strongly contributes to understanding the role of atypical sphingolipids in aging.
We recently found membrane lipids-interacting with ion channels that were critical for their functions, Figures from Duan et al. Science Advances 2019, accepted.
Link to LIPID MAPS ® www.lipidmaps.org
Link to SphinGOMAP © www.sphingomap.org
Link to UniProt www.uniprot.org
Link to IUPHAR/BPS Guide to PHARMACOLOGY www.guidetopharmacology.org
Link to RCSB PDB https://www.rcsb.org