Interacting protein kinases involved in the regulation of flagellar length.

ABSTRACT: A striking difference of the life stages of the protozoan parasite Leishmania is a long flagellum in the insect stage promastigotes and a rudimentary organelle in the mammalian amastigotes. LmxMKK, a mitogen-activated protein (MAP) kinase kinase from Leishmania mexicana, is required for growth of a full-length flagellum. We identified LmxMPK3, a MAP kinase homologue, with a similar expression pattern as LmxMKK being not detectable in amastigotes, up-regulated during the differentiation to promastigotes, constantly expressed in promastigotes, and shut down during the differentiation to amastigotes. LmxMPK3 null mutants resemble the LmxMKK knockouts with flagella reduced to one-fifth of the wild-type length, stumpy cell bodies, and vesicles and membrane fragments in the flagellar pocket. A c

SUBMITTER: Erdmann M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC1415332 | biostudies-literature | 2006 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature