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The summer conference season is now in full swing. As scientists dash from session to session and venue to venue, now is a good time to take stock of what conference attendance seeks to achieve.
The bacterial cytoplasm is rich in filament-forming proteins, from homologues of eukaryotic cytoskeletal elements to other scaffolding and segregation proteins. We now learn that even the metabolic enzyme CTP synthase forms cytoplasmic filaments that affect bacterial cell shape.
Three recent studies reveal unexpected functions of Rap1, a member of the shelterin complex that protects chromosome ends from the activity of DNA repair pathways. Rap1 not only protects telomeres from sister chromatid exchange, but also functions in genome-wide transcriptional regulation and NF-κB-dependent signalling, revealing new perspectives for the telomere field.
The plasma membrane is identified as a source for the formation of autophagosomes, the double membrane vesicles that deliver intracellular components to lysosomes for their degradation.
The metabolic enzyme CTP synthase (CtpS) of Caulobacter crescentus can polymerize into cytoskeletal filaments. It functions together with the intermediate filament protein crescentin to control cell shape.
Both endoplasmic reticulum and mitochondrial membranes are thought to contribute to the formation of autophagosomes during autophagy induction. We now learn that plasma membrane is also involved, and is partly targeted to the growing autophagosome through clathrin-mediated endocytosis.
Mammalian Rap1 protein is found to have a non-telomeric function in regulating the substrate specificity of IKKs towards the p65 subunit of NF-κB, leading to NF-κB transcriptional activity.
The shelterin complex binds and protects mammalian telomeres. The shelterin component, Rap1, binds to non-telomeric regions and has extra-telomeric functions in transcriptional gene regulation.
The significance of autophagy for signal transduction has been unclear. Autophagy negatively regulates Wnt signalling by promoting Dishevelled (Dvl) degradation. The von Hippel-Lindau protein ubiquitylates Dvl to faciliatate its recruitment to autophagosomes through p62.
In bacteria, chromosomes are partitioned by the Par system. Super-resolution microscopy demonstrates that ParA and ParB forms a 'spindle-like' structure and suggests that the pole protein, TipN, anchors the DNA-bound ParA filaments at the new pole.
During yeast cell division, multidrug resistance (MDR) transporters partition unequally, with the older pool remaining in the mother cell. Mutations in MDR transporter genes reduce replicative lifespan, whereas an extra copy of these genes extends it, suggesting that defective MDR proteins may influence replicative ageing.
Tissue-specific stem cells are maintained through signals from their niche. In Drosophila testis, niche-mediated STAT1/2 signals regulate germline stem cells adhesion to their niche, whereas somatic stem cells govern their self-renewal through BMP signalling.
