Abstract
AbstractThe creation and internalization of small, protein‐coated vesicles is a central factor in the uptake of materials from the surfaces of eucaryotic cells through a process known as receptor mediated endocytosis. Under appropriate in vitro conditions, the principal coat component, viz., clathrin, which is found in the cell as a trimer joined at a common hub, assembles into polyhedral ‘baskets’ (‘cages’) containing pentagonal and hexagonal facets. These reconstituted cages have the appearance of miniscule soccer‐ball like structures. Their sizes vary over a finite range whose limits depend on the presence or absence of ancillary proteins (‘assembly proteins’) that are known to increase the tendency for the baskets to form. By fitting data on basket size distributions to simple energetic (thermodynamic) models, one is able to estimate mechanical properties of the clathrin constituents of the baskets and infer the role of assembly proteins in strengthening interactions between the clathrin components of the struts that constitute the edges of the baskets.
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