Editor's Summary
9 February 2006
Closed encounter
Living cells regulate the movement of water via pores in the cell membrane called aquaporins. In a study of plant aquaporin, the spinach molecule was produced in bulk in the yeast Pichia pastoris, a popular gene expression system. Luckily, this technology produced crystals with the pores closed; previously it had only been possible to produce them open. With open and closed pores to hand it was possible to work out the gating mechanism at the molecular level.
Article: Structural mechanism of plant aquaporin gating
Susanna Törnroth-Horsefield, Yi Wang, Kristina Hedfalk, Urban Johanson, Maria Karlsson, Emad Tajkhorshid, Richard Neutze and Per Kjellbom
doi:10.1038/nature04316
Abstract | Full Text | PDF (462K) | Supplementary information