Fig. 4

Characterization of organelles in the simulation. a Size distribution in a population of endosomes after 30 min of simulation. The endosomes were classified according to their prevailing Rab domain and the size was calculated as the radius of a sphere having the same volume than the endosome. Notice that RabA structures were small and that the largest endosomes carried RabD domains. b Same as in a, but the frequency of endosomes carrying different numbers of internal vesicle is plotted. For panels a and b, the endosomes of 5 simulations were used. c A different manner to assess the distribution of internal vesicles among organelles. For this calculation, all internal vesicles contained in RabA endosomes were added and plotted at different time of simulation (see Methods). Same calculations were done for each Rab domain. The left panel shows the internal vesicles accumulated in RabD, RabB and RabC structures. The panel at the right, in an expanded scale, shows the internal vesicles in RabA endosomes and the number of vesicles released at the plasma membrane. The values for this figure correspond to the average of 5 identical simulations