The balance between cholesterol and sphingolipids within the plasma membrane has long
been implicated in endocytic membrane trafficking. However, in contrast to cholesterol
functions, little is still known about the roles of sphingolipids and their metabolites.
Perturbing the cholesterol/sphingomyelin balance was shown to induce narrow tubular
plasma membrane invaginations enriched with sphingosine kinase 1 (SphK1), the enzyme
that converts the bioactive sphingolipid metabolite sphingosine to sphingosine-1-phosphate …