Cytoplasmic streaming in plant cells emerges naturally by microfilament self-organization.

ABSTRACT: Many cells exhibit large-scale active circulation of their entire fluid contents, a process termed cytoplasmic streaming. This phenomenon is particularly prevalent in plant cells, often presenting strikingly regimented flow patterns. The driving mechanism in such cells is known: myosin-coated organelles entrain cytoplasm as they process along actin filament bundles fixed at the periphery. Still unknown, however, is the developmental process that constructs the well-ordered actin configurations required for coherent cell-scale flow. Previous experimental works on streaming regeneration in cells of Characean algae, whose longitudinal flow is perhaps the most regimented of all, hint at an autonomous process of microfilament self-organization driving the formation of streaming patterns during

SUBMITTER: Woodhouse FG 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3761564 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature