A Specific Class of Short Treadmilling Microtubules Enhances Cortical Microtubule Alignment

Guillaume Chomicki,Raymond Wightman,Simon R Turner

doi:10.1016/j.molp.2016.05.008

Guillaume Chomicki, Raymond Wightman + Show 1 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.molp.2016.05.008

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Journal: Molecular plant	Publication Date: May 25, 2016
Citations: 6	License type: cc-by

Affiliation: University of Manchester

Abstract

Anisotropic cell expansion is a property of plant cells that is dependent upon the formation of a highly ordered cortical microtubule (MT) array. The orientation of cortical microtubules is critical for guiding cellulose synthase complexes in the plasma membrane and thereby determining the direction of the cell expansion (Paredez et al., 2006). Recent work has demonstrated a link between MT organization and stresses experienced by the cell during plant cell development (Uyttewaal et al., 2012; Sampathkumar et al., 2014), but how order is generated within the cortical microtubule array has been much debated (Dixit and Cyr, 2004; Wightman and Turner, 2007).

Highlights

Anisotropic cell expansion is a property of plant cells that is dependent upon the formation of a highly ordered cortical microtubule (MT) array
To seek potential differences of MT behavior in distinct array types, we focused on treadmilling and bundling in pavement and petiole cells of wildtype (WT), spr2-1 and bot1-7 mutants that exhibit different levels of MT ordering (Wightman et al, 2013)
The frequency of stMTs was low in the net-like arrays of WT pavement cells, but significantly higher in the ordered arrays found in WT petiole cells and in both pavement and petiole cells of spr2-1 (Figure 1C t-test, p < 0.001)

Summary

Introduction

Anisotropic cell expansion is a property of plant cells that is dependent upon the formation of a highly ordered cortical microtubule (MT) array. To seek potential differences of MT behavior in distinct array types, we focused on treadmilling and bundling in pavement and petiole cells of wildtype (WT), spr2-1 and bot1-7 mutants that exhibit different levels of MT ordering (Wightman et al, 2013). We found that bundling of long MTs, as a result of plus-end growth, was relatively constant in pavement and petiole cells across backgrounds (Supplemental Figure 2).

Results

Conclusion