Cultured melanocytes from dilute mutant mice exhibit dendritic morphology and altered melanosome distribution.

ABSTRACT: Mutant alleles at the dilute unconventional myosin heavy chain locus cause diluted coat color, opisthotonic seizures, and death. The dilute coat color phenotype is caused by irregular clumping of pigment in the hair, but amounts of melanin are unchanged from wild-type controls. The melanocyte phenotype has been described as adendritic, since hair bulb and Harderian gland melanocytes appear to be rounded in tissue sections. These observations do not exclude the possibility that the processes lack pigment, since the melanocyte shape was judged by the distribution of melanin. We have tested this hypothesis by culturing primary melanocytes from dilute mutant and wild-type mice. The mutant melanocytes do not lack processes; instead, they exhibit a concentrated perinuclear distribution of melano

SUBMITTER: Provance DW 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC26171 | biostudies-literature | 1996 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature