Protein phase separation in cell death and survival

Cell death, whether intrinsic or extrinsic, constitutes an essential facet of the lifecycle of a cell population and how it interfaces with its environment. There are numerous pathways that a cell may take to die including apoptosis, necroptosis, autophagy, pyroptosis, and ferroptosis. Phase separation is an idea drawn from the study of physics that has been recently enthusiastically explored in biology. In the biological context, it dictates how given collections of macromolecular species may partition from their surrounding intracellular environment. Given the increasing support for the various mechanisms by which phase separation may orchestrate cellular organization and function, here we explore a few of the various cell death pathways and how phase separation may play an important role. Additionally, given that the converse and natural complement of death is survival, we will briefly discuss how phase separation and various cellular machinery plays a role in cell survival, with a focus on how phase separation may mediate oncogenic development.