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

First published online April 23, 2007

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?

Reverse gear for trypanosomes

Trypanosomes and other protozoa, such as Chlamydomonas, move using flagella powered by dynein motors. These contain one or more catalytic heavy chains and several light and intermediate chains, but how these subunits contribute to motor assembly and function is poorly understood. Kent Hill and colleagues now report that the T. brucei dynein light chain 1 (TbLC1) stabilises the outer dynein arms and is required for forward flagellar motility (see p. 1513). The authors show that TbLC1 is localised along the length of the flagellum and that knocking it down by RNAi causes complete loss of the normal tip-to-base flagellar beat and the emergence of a reverse beat that moves the cells backwards. They also report that the outer arm dyneins are disrupted in TbLC1 mutants, a surprising result given that Chlamydomonas LC1 binds to the catalytic domain of dynein rather than to the domain involved in its oligomerisation. Overall, this first analysis of LC1 function provides important insights into flagellar motility that could aid efforts to exploit the trypanosome flagellum as a drug target in sleeping sickness.

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

Related articles in JCS:

Stuck in reverse: loss of LC1 in Trypanosoma brucei disrupts outer dynein arms and leads to reverse flagellar beat and backward movement

Desiree M. Baron, Zakayi P. Kabututu, and Kent L. Hill
JCS 2007 120: 1513-1520. [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?