"The work of the recently named award Nobel Laureates in Medicine or Physiology, James E. Rothman, Randy W. Schekman and Tomas C. Südhof, is a clear example of how a quality basic research allows, not only to know better the behavior of the cell in status normal, but also to understand the cellular alterations that occur in some diseases". The biologist Marián Burrell, professor at department of Histology and Anatomy Pathology at the University of Navarra, explained how the mechanism that regulates vesicular transport in the cell works, during the course of Science Week.

According to him, a large part of the molecules travel through the cell inside spherical membranous Structures called vesicles. "This transport or vesicular traffic occurs in all eukaryotic cells, from the simplest (yeast) to any cell in our organism. For this, each of these vesicles must form in a specific place in the cell, contain the appropriate materials and transport them with punctuality and precision to their final destinations," he emphasized.

On the other hand, he pointed out that the defects that occur in the complex machinery that regulates vesicular traffic can affect the secretion of important molecules that are directly related to diseases such as diabetes (alteration in the secretion of hormones); autism, schizophrenia or epilepsy (due to failures in the communication between neurons) or diseases of the immune system (due to defects in the so-called immunological synapse).

The University of Navarra's Science Week lecture series continues tomorrow Thursday and Friday with"Alzheimer's Disease: from Biology to Pharmacy" and"Fundamental Milestones in Human Evolution".