Membraneless organelles (MOs) are dynamic liquid condensates that host a variety of
specific cellular processes, such as ribosome biogenesis or RNA degradation. MOs form
through liquid-liquid phase separation (LLPS), a process that relies on multivalent
weak interactions of the constituent proteins and other macromolecules. Since the
first discoveries of certain proteins being able to drive LLPS, it emerged as a general
mechanism for the effective organization of cellular space that is exploited in all
kingdoms of life. While numerous experimental studies report novel cases, the computational
identification of LLPS drivers is lagging behind, and many open questions remain about
the sequence determinants, composition, regulation and biological relevance of the
resulting condensates. Our limited ability to overcome these issues is largely due
to the lack of a dedicated LLPS database. Therefore, here we introduce PhaSePro (https://phasepro.elte.hu),
an openly accessible, comprehensive, manually curated database of experimentally validated
LLPS driver proteins/protein regions. It not only provides a wealth of information
on such systems, but improves the standardization of data by introducing novel LLPS-specific
controlled vocabularies. PhaSePro can be accessed through an appealing, user-friendly
interface and thus has definite potential to become the central resource in this dynamically
developing field.
