Vimentin intermediate filaments structure and mechanically support microtubules in cells
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Abstract
The eukaryotic cytoskeleton comprises three types of mechanically distinct biopoly-mers – actin filaments, microtubules and intermediate filaments (IFs)– along with pas-sive crosslinkers and active molecular motors. Among these filament types, IFs are expressed in a cell-type specific manner and vimentin is found in cells of mesenchymal origin. The composite cytoskeletal network determines the mechanical and dynamic properties of the cell and is specifically governed by the interplay of the three different filament systems. We study the influence of vimentin IFs on the mechanics and net-work structure of microtubules by analyzing fluorescence micrographs of fibroblasts on protein micropatterns. We develop and apply quantitative, automated data analysis to a large number of cells, thus mitigating the considerable natural variance in data from biological cells. We find that the presence of a vimentin IF network structures and aligns microtubules in the cell interior. On a local scale, we observe higher micro-tubule curvatures when vimentin IFs are present, irrespective of whether the cells are polarized or not. Our results suggest that the vimentin IF network laterally supports microtubules against compressive buckling forces and further helps to structure the microtubule network, thus possibly leading to a more efficient intracellular transport system along the microtubules.
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Our results suggest that the vimentin IF network laterally supports microtubules against compressive buckling forces and further helps to structure the microtubule network, thus possibly leading to a more efficient intracellular transport system along the microtubules.
Really interesting study with some beautiful microscopy and analysis! Studies looking at interactions between the different cytoskeletal elements are always great, and I'm left wondering how the third biopolymer, actin, factors in.
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an-alyze
Super minor comment but there are a few places throughout the paper where words are randomly hyphenated in the middle of the word.
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In the cell interior, however, there is a striking difference: in NIH3T3 cells, we observe a strong alignment, whereas in vim-/- cell, there is no such alignment.
Very cool!
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Microtubule and vimentin IF networks in cells on patterns.
It would be nice to see images with just microtubules and just vimentin for each condition.
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the microtubule networks represented in cyan and the vimentin IF networks shown in magenta
This might be beyond the scope of this paper or already done somewhere, but the networks look quite different between the two cell shapes even in just wild-type cells. I'm curious if there are any more in depth characterizations between these?
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We create circle-and crossbow-shaped fibronectin micropatterns, corresponding to unpolarized and polarized cells
Do the cytoskeletal and other components of the cell look mostly normal in these compared to cells not grown on these micropatterns?
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