Cell polarity articles within Nature Communications

Featured

• Article | 07 August 2014

  Nitric oxide enhances Th9 cell differentiation and airway inflammation

  Th9 cells are a subset of T helper cells that protect hosts against helminthic infection, but can also mediate allergic disease through overexpression of the cytokine IL-9. Here, Niedbala et al.show that nitric oxide is a potent enhancer of Th9 differentiation via the activation of p53 protein.

  • Wanda Niedbala
  • , Anne-Gaelle Besnard
  •  & Foo Y. Liew

• Article | 01 August 2014

  AmotL2 disrupts apical–basal cell polarity and promotes tumour invasion

  Loss of cell polarity is frequently observed in metastatic tumours. Mojallal et al.show that this loss is associated with expression of the scaffold protein AmotL2 in human tumours, and reveal that AmotL2 disrupts the transport of polarity complexes to the plasma membrane following its induction by hypoxia.

  • Mahdi Mojallal
  • , Yujuan Zheng
  •  & Lars Holmgren

• Article | 19 June 2014

  Sustained Wnt/β-catenin signalling causes neuroepithelial aberrations through the accumulation of aPKC at the apical pole

  Atypical protein kinase C (aPKC) is expressed in the apical complex of epithelial cells, which is required for maintaining the polarity of epithelial cells. Herrera et al. show that stable beta-catenin signalling prevents this process by restricting aPKC expression and disrupting apical complex function.

  • Antonio Herrera
  • , Murielle Saade
  •  & Sebastian Pons

• Article | 13 May 2014

  Role of Rab11 in planar cell polarity and apical constriction during vertebrate neural tube closure

  Epithelial folding is a critical process for vertebrate neural tube closure, however, its spatial regulation is largely unknown. Here Ossipova et al. show that Rab11-positive recycling endosomes acquire bilaterally symmetric distribution in the Xenopusneural plate, and that this polarization is essential for neural tube formation.

  • Olga Ossipova
  • , Kyeongmi Kim
  •  & Sergei Y. Sokol

• Article
  15 November 2013 | Open Access

  Arabidopsis SABRE and CLASP interact to stabilize cell division plane orientation and planar polarity

  Cell and planar polarity are important for the organization of cells within organisms. Pietra et al. demonstrate in Arabidopsisthat the SABRE protein is important for mediating cell and planar polarity by stabilizing the orientation of microtubules during cell division and cell elongation.

  • Stefano Pietra
  • , Anna Gustavsson
  •  & Markus Grebe

• Article | 24 October 2013

  Polycystin-1 binds Par3/aPKC and controls convergent extension during renal tubular morphogenesis

  Loss-of-function mutations in PKD1, the gene encoding the plasma membrane receptor Polycystin-1, lead to renal cyst formation in polycystic kidney disease. Here, Castelli et al. show that Polycystin-1 interacts with the Par3 polarity complex and has a role in the morphogenesis of kidney tubules during mouse development.

  • Maddalena Castelli
  • , Manila Boca
  •  & Alessandra Boletta

• Article
  14 May 2013 | Open Access

  Spatial segregation of polarity factors into distinct cortical clusters is required for cell polarity control

  Cell polarity is generated and maintained by the spatial accumulation of polarity factors. By imaging fission yeast cells ‘end-on’, the authors show that the polarity factors Tea1 and Tea3 segregate into distinct clusters, and that surprisingly, their segregation is critical for cell polarization.

  • James Dodgson
  • , Anatole Chessel
  •  & Rafael E. Carazo-Salas

• Article
  07 May 2013 | Open Access

  Establishment of a robust single axis of cell polarity by coupling multiple positive feedback loops

  A positive feedback loop which results in localized accumulation of the small GTPase Cdc42 generates cell polarity in budding yeast; however, such loops are inherently susceptible to noise. Here the authors demonstrate how two pathways that mediate Cdc42 recycling work together to ensure the robustness of symmetry breaking.

  • Tina Freisinger
  • , Ben Klünder
  •  & Roland Wedlich-Söldner

• Article | 30 April 2013

  Regulation of asymmetric cell division and polarity by Scribble is not required for humoral immunity

  B cells are thought to divide asymmetrically to generate distinct lineages required for adaptive immunity. Hawkins et al. find that surprisingly, mice lacking components of a complex required for asymmetric cell division display normal responses to vaccination and viral infection.

  • Edwin D. Hawkins
  • , Jane Oliaro
  •  & Sarah M. Russell

• Article | 22 January 2013

  Non-uniform membrane diffusion enables steady-state cell polarization via vesicular trafficking

  The mechanism by which proteins become polarized to a specific cortical site in budding yeast cells has been a topic of recent debate. Slaughter et al.show that differing diffusion rates of Cdc42 within plasma membrane environments sustain the polarized state.

  • Brian D. Slaughter
  • , Jay R. Unruh
  •  & Rong Li

• Article | 27 March 2012

  Poly(ADP-ribose) controls DE-cadherin-dependent stem cell maintenance and oocyte localization

  Drosophilagermline stem cells are anchored to their niche via DE-cadherin. In this study, poly(ADP-ribose) is shown to regulate the expression of DE-cadherin via the heterogeneous nuclear ribonucleoprotein, hnRNPA1, and defects in poly(ADP-ribose) catabolism or hnRNPA1 deficiency lead to the loss of germline stem cells.

  • Yingbiao Ji
  •  & Alexei V. Tulin

• Article | 14 February 2012

  CPEB-mediated ZO-1 mRNA localization is required for epithelial tight-junction assembly and cell polarity

  Zonal occludens and claudin form tight junctions near the apical surface of cells and are important in polarized epithelia. In this study, the translational regulatory sequence-specific RNA binding protein CPEB is shown to be required for the correct localization of zona occluden 1 mRNA in mammary epithelial cells.

  • Kentaro Nagaoka
  • , Tsuyoshi Udagawa
  •  & Joel D. Richter