You can take any aspect of cell transport and elaborate on it in more detail. Fo

Question

You can take any aspect of cell transport and elaborate on it in more detail. For example, how it works, what is getting transported, why transport is important, specific features, what happens when it goes wrong, how it is connected to other cellular processes like signaling or metabolism, how it can be involved in medical conditions, or why drugs might be used to change transport of certain molecules in some way. I Need an outside source for this.. please use citation in the response and works cited at the end..do not use other solutions for this post

Explanation / Answer

I would like to explain the cellular transport of glucose and would discuss how it works, what signals are involved, what happens if cellular uptake of transport is not working fine etc.

Glucose is the energy source of our body and is needed by each and every cell to maintain its basic functions. Its demand in particular cells increases under specific conditions like exercise (muscle), mental work (brain) etc. Transport of the glucose is controlled by a peptide hormone known as insulin via insulin receptor-mediated signaling. A part of glucose can enter the cell through diffusion process but when the glucose is needed in a higher amount, then insulin signaling get activated. Insulin is released from the beta cells of the islet of Langerhans in pancreas into the blood circulation. Insulin binds to the alpha subunit of insulin receptor as a result of which insulin receptor dimerization takes place. The insulin receptor is a transmembranous receptor and is having two subunit, alpha subunit is extracellular (where insulin bind) and beta subunit in intracellular. Upon dimerization, the tyrosine kinase residue on the beta subunit of this receptor comes close to each other and phosphorylates each other and thereby initiating an insulin signaling cascade. These phosphorylated tyrosine residues phosphorylate insulin receptor substrate 1 and 2 (IRS1, IRS2) which then migrate to the cytoplasm and through a chain of phosphorylation activation leads to the phosphorylation and activation of Akt. This activated Akt then move to the nucleus where it binds to the insulin sensitive gene elements and initiates a transcription generation and glucose transporter mRNA. mRNA moves out of the cells and synthesize glucose transporter protein (GLUT) on the ribosome. GLUT is stored in the glucose vesicles inside the cells. Upon a signal from the insulin, these vesicle moves towards the cell membrane and GLUT are translocated to the cell membrane. Glucose can now freely enter the cell through these transporters. When the cellular demand is completed, insulin receptor is internalized and degraded and thereby this signaling is stopped.

This process is very important in metabolism. It is glucose that is ultimately metabolized inside cells or mitochondria to generate energy in form of ATP. ATP is the stored energy of our body. If there is any defect in the glucose transport mechanism then cells will not have enough energy and will starve to death. This is the case in diabetes mellitus, which can be either type I diabetes in which due to genetic defect insulin is not synthesized and thereby glucose cannot enter the cell or type II diabetes mellitus in which insulin receptors become resistant to insulin and thereby insulin signaling is not activated. Now the glucose is not disposed into the cells and this gives rise to elevated blood sugar levels. This further contributes to secondary complications of diabetes like neuropathy, retinopathy, etc. due to cell death because of starvation leading to the development of these complications

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