They want to measure how many lipids are in a white blood cell

2003/12/01 Elhuyar Zientzia Iturria: Elhuyar aldizkaria

• Biologia

A group of international researchers has formed the consortium Mapa de Lípidos. The aim of this consortium is to identify and measure all lipids present in a white blood cell called macrophage. Lipids form a large part of the molecules of the human body. The cell membrane is made up of lipids, among others, and estrogen hormones and testosterone are also lipids.

The consortium is made up of 18 entities. Six of them will try to identify the types of lipids present in the macrophages of mice. The work of the rest will consist in making known the position of these lipids in the cell and how they react.

To carry out this work, researchers will use mass spectrometry. In recent years, the technique of mass spectrometer has been significantly improved and currently the apparatus can identify hundreds of lipids from a sample simultaneously.