The Hindu Business Line : A peep into the animated life of cells

Don’t write off the cells as listless, countless flock of tiny specks. They have their own life too — as complex, as dynamic and as exciting as our own.

A cell is not a balloon. It does have a ‘stomach’, a communication system and a mechanism to identify the target proteins.

Perhaps, it looks more intelligent than what they ultimately make — the living beings.

See this, a cell in the blood (remember, an average cell is one-tenth of a millimetre) chases a bacteria like a guided missile, ably supported by the most advanced GPS intelligence, through a maze of other cells and devours it.

The tiny cell, the basic form of life, hounds the bacteria, getting signals from the secretions left out by the target organism!

No, this is not fiction. If you still don’t believe, you should listen to Prof. Judith Klumperman from the Netherlands, who will take you through the inner world of the cell and explain how beautiful and clever the cells are.

In fact, they hold the key for several pertinent attributes and diseases, we as individuals represent and carry forward.

She presented the recorded footage of the chase of the cell to a group of scientists and would-be scientists at the Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB) here on Monday.

In a scintillating lecture delivered to mark the 20th Foundation Day of CCBM here on Monday, Prof. Klumperman gave a peep into the animated life of cells.

“The cell is not an empty balloon,” said the Dutch scientist.

The cells contained several constituents such as transport vesicles, lysosomes and endoplasmic reticulum — each of them having their own functions.

Showing the artist’s impression (in fact, an impression of her guru Dr Hans J. Geuze), she related how each of these elements worked to let the cell going.

“They hold the key for genetic diseases such as infertility, auto-immune diseases and cancer,” she said.

Prof. Klumperman is the Head of Cell Microscopy Center at the University Medical Center (Utrecht).