Endocrine Abstracts

The lipid species that comprise cell membranes are not uniformly distributed. Instead different lipids can become organised into patches, or microdomains, in the membrane. These microdomains, often termed lipid rafts, can include or exclude proteins with the result that they present a locally different character compared to the surrounding membrane. Lipid rafts are enriched in cholesterol and glycosphingolipid; the saturated acyl chains of the sphingolipids promotes their dens...