biology

Margaret Robinson

Margaret Robinson is a biology topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Margaret Robinson rather than just read about it. In short: Margaret Scott Robinson (born 1951) is a British molecular cell biologist, a professor and researcher in the Cambridge Institute for Medical Research, at the University of Cambridge. Education Robinson received her Bachelor of Arts degree in biology from Smith College in Massachusetts.

Key takeaways

Margaret Robinson belongs to biology; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Margaret Robinson to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Margaret Robinson from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Margaret Scott Robinson (born 1951) is a British molecular cell biologist, a professor and researcher in the Cambridge Institute for Medical Research, at the University of Cambridge.

Education Robinson received her Bachelor of Arts degree in biology from Smith College in Massachusetts. She completed her PhD at Harvard University supervised by David Albertini and also Barbara Pearse. In 2003 she was appointed Professor of Molecular Cell Biology at the Cambridge Institute for Medical Research and is conducting research on coated vesicle proteins. Margaret Robinson was first exposed about science early in her life from reading about Marie Curie. While enrolled at Smith College, she planned on being an English or theater major. However, due to university requirements, Margaret had to complete an introductory biology course. In that course, Jeanne Powell gave a lecture on cells and showed her students electron micrographs. This is when Margaret really became interested in cellular biology; the complexity of cells intrigued her. After receiving her undergraduate degree, Robinson took a year off and ended up at Harvard Medical School. Robinson eventually joined a new lab and was able to conduct research on anything she liked. Due to her inexperience, her research did not go as planned and was nearly kicked out of graduate school. Robinson had to stop working on her interest in coated vesicles and work on something closer to what the lab was researching. Robinson eventually started a postdoctoral research with Barbara Pearse, joining her at the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology in December 1982. Her interest was in clathrin-coated vesicles that binds to cargo. She eventually succeeded in purifying components of the coat that were not clathrin and are now known as adaptor proteins. These proteins sit between clathrin, which forms the vesicle's outer shell and also the vesicle membrane. Continuing, Margaret discovered that there were two different populations of clathrin-coated vesicles, one that uses AP-2 at the plasma membrane and one that uses AP-1 and was associated with intracellular membranes. AP-1 and AP-2 are both heterotetramers with related subunits. They both have two large subunits and the other subunit is closely related in AP-1 and AP-2.

Research Her achievements include the discovery of adaptins, which are specific proteins that manage cell-trafficking to ensure the correct cell cargo is transported to the right location. She also discovered different combinations of adapting, when together with clathrin, form a coat around vesicles that bud from intracellular membranes and act as transporters for protein packages to be distributed in the cell. She also developed the technique "knock sideways," which inactivates proteins in seconds. After finishing her postdoc, she was able to start her own lab. Her main focus was to learn more about the AP protein in depth. She had to also work with DNA because in order to characterize the complexes thoroughly, she needed to clone the subunits. Robinson and her lab managed to find another AP complex, AP-3, which interacts with lysosomal membrane proteins such as LAMP1. AP-3 also interacts with tyrosinase, which is a key enzyme in melanin biosynthesis, so AP-3 is important for tyrosinase trafficking to premelanosomes. As of 2016 Robinson has a lab at Cambridge Institute for Medical Research. She specifically works with coated vesicles. The best-characterized coated vesicles are the clathrin-coated vesicles (CCVs). The coats on CCVs are primarily of clathrin, adaptor protein (AP) complexes, and alternative adaptors. Her working hypothesis is that for each trafficking pathway, there are a number of different adaptors, each of which is recruited independently onto the appropriate membrane. Once on the membrane, the various adaptors would work together to package different types of cargo into the newly forming vesicle. Robinson and her researchers use several approaches to look for novel adaptors and other components of the trafficking machinery, including proteomic analyses of sub cellular fractions, genome-wide siRNA library screening, insertional mutagenesis, and a new method they developed for rapidly inactivating proteins, called 'knock sideways'. Her current projects include establishing the functions of AP-1 and other adaptors in differentiated cells; matching up machinery and cargo proteins; investigating how clathrin and adaptors are hijacked by the HIV-1-encoded protein Nef; determine why mutations in the non-clathrin adaptors AP-4 and AP-5 cause hereditary spastic paraplegia; and exploring the evolution of adaptors. Her laboratory uses many techniques including immunolocalisation at the light and electron microscope levels, sub cellular fractionation, protein purification, proteomics, flow cytometry, live cell imaging, and X-ray crystallography.

Impact of research Every form of eukaryotic life on earth contains coated vesicles and adaptors. Her work is also speculated to play a key role in evolution of eukaryotes form prokaryotes over two billion years ago. Her work also has medical implications. Some adaptors are mutated in certain genetic disorders, and adaptors are frequently exploited by pathogens . For example, the HIV genome encodes a protein called Nef, which is required for the development of AIDS, and which works by hijacking adaptors and using them to modify the surface of the infected cell. Robinson's work explains how coated vesicles sort cargo but also provides tools that can be used by others to address their own favorite problems. For instance, her newly developed method called knocksideways. Knocksideways gets rid of proteins rapidly. Her technique has found its way into other labs who are also interested in how particular proteins contribute to different stages of cell division.

Selected publications

Awards and honours Robinson has received many honors working as a cellular biologist. She was awarded a Wellcome Trust Principal Research Fellowship in 1999 and in 2003 she was appointed Professor of Molecular Cell Biology. She was elected a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences in 2001 and member of the European Molecular Biology Organization in the same year. She was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) in 2012. The Wellcome Trust also has funded her research for over 25 years.

References

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Margaret Robinson

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Margaret Robinson claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In biology, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Margaret Robinson before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Margaret Robinson ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Margaret Robinson

In research: Margaret Robinson appears in biology research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Margaret Robinson in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Margaret Robinson is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1951 births, 20th-century British biologists, 20th-century British women biologists, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Margaret Robinson outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Margaret Robinson in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Margaret Robinson means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Margaret Robinson out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Margaret Robinson in simple terms?

Margaret Scott Robinson (born 1951) is a British molecular cell biologist, a professor and researcher in the Cambridge Institute for Medical Research, at the University of Cambridge. Education Robinson received her Bachelor of Arts degree in biology from Smith College in Massachusetts.

Why does Margaret Robinson matter?

Because it connects several biology ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Margaret Robinson?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Margaret Robinson.