QUICK SEARCH:   [advanced] Author: Keyword(s):
Home     Help     Feedback     Subscriptions     Archive     Search     Table of Contents

This Article Full Text (PDF) Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Related articles in JCS Similar articles in this journal Alert me to new issues of the journal Download to citation manager Citing Articles Citing Articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Search for Related Content Social Bookmarking                         What's this?

Microtubule nucleation in plants

Microtubule nucleation in yeast and animal cells is initiated by -tubulin ring complexes (-TuRCs) associated with centrosomes or spindle pole bodies. Microtubule nucleation in plants is less well understood: the microtubule arrays differ significantly from those in animals and lack centrosome-like microtubule-organizing centres (MTOCs). Moreover, -tubulin is distributed along plant microtubules rather than at one end, which is perplexing given its role in nucleation in animals and yeast. Anne-Catherine Schmit and co-workers now provide evidence that plants do in fact use -TuRC-like structures to nucleate microtubules (see p. 2423). They have cloned and characterized rice and Arabidopsis orthologues of the -TuRC component SPC98, demonstrating that higher plants contain -TuRC components other than -tubulin. Significantly, SPC98 does not colocalize with -tubulin along the length of plant microtubules but does colocalize with it at the nuclear surface and cell cortex - locations for putative plant MTOCs. These findings suggest that -TuRCs containing SPC98 and -tubulin function in microtubule nucleation at plant MTOCs but that -tubulin decorating the length of microtubules has an additional, -TuRC-independent function.

CiteULike    Complore    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter    What's this?

Related articles in JCS:

The plant Spc98p homologue colocalizes with -tubulin at microtubule nucleation sites and is required for microtubule nucleation

Mathieu Erhardt, Virginie Stoppin-Mellet, Sarah Campagne, Jean Canaday, Jérôme Mutterer, Tanja Fabian, Margret Sauter, Thierry Muller, Christine Peter, Anne-Marie Lambert, and Anne-Catherine Schmit
JCS 2002 115: 2423-2431. [Abstract] [Full Text]  

This Article Full Text (PDF) Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Related articles in JCS Similar articles in this journal Alert me to new issues of the journal Download to citation manager Citing Articles Citing Articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Search for Related Content Social Bookmarking                         What's this?