Choah Kim
Researcher in David Sabatini's lab at the Whitehead Institute who contributed to three studies on how amino acids at the lysosome are sensed by mTORC1
Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (papers 2013–2017, affiliation at the time of the studies) · current position not confirmed
Portrait: Sampson Lab, Boston Children's Hospital / Harvard
Choah Kim is a co-author on three Atlas papers from David Sabatini's lab that together trace how amino acid signals reach mTORC1, the growth-control complex, at the lysosome. In TSU2013, the team showed that folliculin, a tumour suppressor protein, works with its partner FNIP as a GAP for the Rag GTPases RagC and RagD. A GAP is a helper protein that makes a switch protein turn itself off. RagC or RagD in this GDP-bound state is needed for the Rag pair to bind mTORC1 and bring it to the lysosome when amino acids are present.
In WAN2015, the lab found that SLC38A9, a transporter in the lysosome membrane, binds the Rag-Ragulator machinery and passes on the message that arginine is available. In ABU2017, lysosomes were pulled out of human cells within minutes and their contents measured, showing that blocking mTOR strongly reduces the release of most essential amino acids from the lysosome. All three studies were done in cultured cells.
PubMed lists Kim at the Whitehead Institute and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology on these papers. The name Choah Kim is shared by several researchers in PubMed, and no official page was found that connects this person to a later position, so the current position is not given here.
Milestones in the Atlas
A selection, not a full bibliography: only papers that meet the Atlas inclusion criteria.
| Year | Evidence | Study |
|---|---|---|
| 2013 | M | The folliculin tumor suppressor is a GAP for the RagC/D GTPases that signal amino acid levels to mTORC1 TSU2013 Co-author on the cell study showing that folliculin-FNIP is a GAP for RagC and RagD, needed for amino acids to bring mTORC1 to the lysosome. |
| 2015 | M | Metabolism. Lysosomal amino acid transporter SLC38A9 signals arginine sufficiency to mTORC1 WAN2015 Co-author on the cell study showing that the lysosomal transporter SLC38A9 signals arginine sufficiency to mTORC1. |
| 2017 | M | Lysosomal metabolomics reveals V-ATPase- and mTOR-dependent regulation of amino acid efflux from lysosomes ABU2017 Co-author on the lysosomal metabolomics study showing that mTOR controls the release of essential amino acids from lysosomes. |
Co-authors in the Atlas 16
People with a profile here who share at least one study with Choah Kim.
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- David M. Sabatini 2 shared studies Identified mTOR (as RAFT1) in 1994. His lab then mapped much of the machinery around it: raptor and rictor at the core of mTORC1 and mTORC2, the Rag–Ragulator system that docks mTORC1 on the lysosome, and the sensors that detect leucine, arginine and SAM
- Liron Bar-Peled 2 shared studies Showed as a Sabatini-lab graduate student that Ragulator switches the Rag GTPases on, acting as their GEF. He also discovered GATOR1 and GATOR2; GATOR1 switches the Rags off and its genes are mutated in some cancers
- Lynne Chantranupong 2 shared studies Showed as a Sabatini-lab graduate student that the Sestrins act through GATOR2 to regulate amino-acid signalling to mTORC1. She then discovered the CASTOR proteins, the cell's arginine sensors for the pathway
- Roberto Zoncu 2 shared studies Showed as a postdoc that mTORC1 senses amino acids from inside the lysosome, through the v-ATPase and Ragulator. His Berkeley lab has since mapped how the Rag GTPases and the folliculin complex switch mTORC1 on, and how lysosomal cholesterol feeds into the same system
- Tim Wang 2 shared studies Co-developed genome-wide CRISPR screening in human cells (reported in parallel by Feng Zhang's lab) as a graduate student with David Sabatini and Eric Lander, and contributed to studies showing that the 4E-BPs mediate mTORC1's control of translation and that CASTOR1 senses arginine
- Zhi-Yang Tsun 2 shared studies Biologist who, as first author in David Sabatini's lab, showed that the tumour suppressor folliculin is a GAP for the RagC and RagD GTPases that carry the amino acid signal to mTORC1
- Elizabeth D. Yuan Second author on the study showing that S6K1 phosphorylates BMAL1 to link mTOR signalling with circadian protein synthesis, and co-author on the follow-up in tuberous sclerosis models.
- Elizaveta Freinkman Chemist and mass-spectrometry specialist at the Whitehead Institute who measured metabolites for many studies of nutrient sensing and cancer metabolism, including the lysosome amino acid work behind two Atlas papers
- Eric Spooner Manager of the Whitehead Institute's Proteomics Core Facility, whose mass spectrometry work identified proteins in complexes for many Whitehead studies, including two on amino acid sensing upstream of mTORC1
- Gregory A. Wyant Showed that the lysosomal protein SLC38A9 exports leucine and other essential amino acids out of the lysosome, letting cells grow on proteins they have taken up and broken down there
- Kuang Shen Solved, as a Sabatini-lab postdoc, cryo-EM structures of GATOR1 and of the FLCN–FNIP2–Rag–Ragulator complex, two switches that set mTORC1 activity. His UMass Chan lab studies the structural basis of nutrient sensing
- Monther Abu-Remaileh Worked out how to isolate lysosomes fast enough to measure what is inside them, and found that mTOR controls what gets out
- Nouf N. Laqtom Cell biologist who helped develop methods to purify intact lysosomes and used them to find what the Batten disease gene CLN3 does, and who now runs a lab at KAUST on lysosome and endoplasmic reticulum defects in rare brain and metabolic diseases
- Rachel L. Wolfson Identified Sestrin2 as the direct leucine sensor of the mTORC1 pathway as a Sabatini-lab MD-PhD student. She also co-discovered KICSTOR, the complex that recruits GATOR1 to the lysosome
- Shuyu Wang Co-discovered SLC38A9 as a Sabatini-lab MD-PhD student, a lysosomal amino-acid transporter that signals arginine sufficiency to mTORC1
- Sze Ham Chan Researcher at the Whitehead Institute who contributed to studies of lysosome contents, nutrient sensing and cancer metabolism, mostly from David Sabatini's lab
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