Biological Communication PhD graduate student Joseph McDermott finds the first selenium transporter ever

Selenium (Se), element 34, is not as well known as the elements right above it in the periodic table: oxygen and sulfur. Yet, it plays a key role in biology. One interesting feature of selenium is that our bodies need its concentration to be just right: too little and we suffer from selenium deficiency, and too much leads to selenium toxicity. Therefore, we need a mechanism to maintain a tightly controlled selenium concentration. One way to regulate this concentration is by controlling the uptake of selenium (or the selenium-containing anion selenite, HSeO₃^-) from the environment. Yet, no transporter of selenium has ever been identified in any organism….until now.

When searching for a novel and as-yet unknown biological molecule, often it is best to start with a simple organism. One of the simplest eukaryotic cells is yeast. In the November 15 issue of Molecular Biology of the Cell, Assistant Professor and CBR member Zijuan Liu of the Department of Biological Sciences reports on “A High Affinity Selenite Transporter in Yeast.” The paper concludes that their results are not only important for understanding yeast, but also will “shed light on the study of selenite uptake mechanisms in other organisms. As selenite is used in trials for the treatment of various diseases…as well as a promising antagonistic reagent for arsenic and other toxic metals…it is critical to identify the selenite transporters in humans.”

The lead author on the paper is Joseph McDermott, a prolific graduate student in the Biomedical Sciences: Biological Communication PhD program who has published several papers with Liu. The research was supported by a grant from the National Institutes of Health.