Actin, a globular protein found in all eukaryotic cells, is a workhorse that varies remarkably little from baker's yeast to the human body.
Part of the cytoskeleton, actin assembles into networks of filaments that give the cell structural plasticity while driving many essential functions, from cell motility and division, to vesicle and organelle transport within the cell. In a groundbreaking new study in the current issue of Developmental Cell, Brandeis researchers raise the curtain on how this actin maintains just the right filament length to keep the cell healthy and happily dividing.
Using baker's yeast as the model organism, Brandeis researchers Melissa Chesarone, Christopher Gould, and James Moseley, all in the lab of biologist Bruce Goode, set out to discover how the length of actin fibers is controlled. By answering this question, the scientists sought to advance understanding of asymmetrical cell division, a process that not only allows yeast to divide, but also ensures the proper renewal of human stem cells and plays a crucial role in early stages of embryonic development.
In yeast cells, as in all other cells, actin fibers serve as internal "railways" or tracks that give the cell directionality and provide the wherewithal for transporting various molecular and membrane-bound cargoes from one end of the cell to the other. Molecular machines called formins produce many of the actin fibers, but in the absence of a displacement factor to put a brake on the process, formins will essentially stop at nothing, producing excessively long actin filaments at ridiculously fast rates, and wreaking cellular havoc, says Goode. In humans, genetic defects in formins are associated with conditions such as infertility and deafness.