JCB logo
Direct PCR from Finnzymes
  Home | Help | Feedback | Subscriptions | Archive | Search | Table of Contents

Published 7 June 2004. doi:10.1083/jcb.200402130
The Rockefeller University Press, 0021-9525 $8.00
JCB, Volume 165, Number 5, 673-683
This Article
Right arrow Full Text
Right arrow PDF (Full Text)
Right arrow PPT slides of all figures
Right arrow Supplemental Material Index
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Citation Map
Services
Right arrow Email this article
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in PubMed
Right arrow Alert me to new content in the JCB
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Citing Articles
Right arrow Citing Articles via CrossRef
Right arrow Citing Articles via Google Scholar
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Martinez-Campos, M.
Right arrow Articles by Raff, J. W.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
PubMed
Right arrow PubMed Citation
Right arrow Articles by Martinez-Campos, M.
Right arrow Articles by Raff, J. W.
Social Bookmarking
 Add to CiteULike   Add to Complore   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us   Add to Digg   Add to Reddit   Add to Technorati  
What's this?

Article

The Drosophila pericentrin-like protein is essential for cilia/flagella function, but appears to be dispensable for mitosis

Maruxa Martinez-Campos1, Renata Basto1, James Baker2, Maurice Kernan2, and Jordan W. Raff1

1 Wellcome Trust/Cancer Research UK Gurdon Institute, Department of Genetics, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 1QR, England, UK
2 Department of Neurobiology and Behavior, State University of New York at Stony Brook, Stony Brook, NY 11794

Address correspondence to Jordan W. Raff, Wellcome Trust/Cancer Research UK Gurdon Institute, Tennis Court Rd., Cambridge CB2 1QR, England, UK. Tel.: (44) 1223-334114. Fax: (44) 1223-334089. email: j.raff{at}welc.cam.ac.uk

Centrosomes consist of a pair of centrioles surrounded by an amorphous pericentriolar material (PCM). Proteins that contain a Pericentrin/AKAP450 centrosomal targeting (PACT) domain have been implicated in recruiting several proteins to the PCM. We show that the only PACT domain protein in Drosophila (the Drosophila pericentrin-like protein [D-PLP]) is associated with both the centrioles and the PCM, and is essential for the efficient centrosomal recruitment of all six PCM components that we tested. Surprisingly, however, all six PCM components are eventually recruited to centrosomes during mitosis in d-plp mutant cells, and mitosis is not dramatically perturbed. Although viable, d-plp mutant flies are severely uncoordinated, a phenotype usually associated with defects in mechanosensory neuron function. We show that the sensory cilia of these neurons are malformed and the neurons are nonfunctional in d-plp mutants. Moreover, the flagella in mutant sperm are nonmotile. Thus, D-PLP is essential for the formation of functional cilia and flagella in flies.

Key Words: PACT domain; centrosome; centriole; Drosophila; mitosis


M. Martinez-Campos and R. Basto contributed equally to this paper.

The online version of this article includes supplemental material.


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




  Home | Help | Feedback | Subscriptions | Archive | Search | Table of Contents