Regulation of Microtubule Severing by Katanin Subunits during Neuronal Development
Yu, Wenqian, Solowska, Joanna M., Qiang, Liang, Karabay, Arzu, Baird, Douglas, Baas, Peter W.
Katanin, the microtubule-severing protein, consists of a subunit termed P60 that breaks the lattice of the microtubule and another subunit termed P80, the functions of which are not well understood....
Tau-dependent microtubule disassembly initiated by prefibrillar β-amyloid
King, Michelle E., Kan, Ho-Man, Baas, Peter W., Erisir, Alev, Glabe, Charles G., Bloom, George S.
Alzheimer's Disease (AD) is defined histopathologically by extracellular β-amyloid (Aβ) fibrils plus intraneuronal tau filaments. Studies of transgenic mice and cultured cells indicate that AD is...
Role of cytoplasmic dynein in the axonal transport of microtubules and neurofilaments
He, Yan, Francis, Franto, Myers, Kenneth A., Yu, Wenqian, Black, Mark M., Baas, Peter W.
Recent studies have shown that the transport of microtubules (MTs) and neurofilaments (NFs) within the axon is rapid, infrequent, asynchronous, and bidirectional. Here, we used RNA interference to...
Kinesin-5 regulates the growth of the axon by acting as a brake on its microtubule array
Myers, Kenneth A., Baas, Peter W.
Kinesin-5 is a homotetrameric motor protein that interacts with adjacent microtubules in the mitotic spindle. Kinesin-5 is also highly expressed in developing postmitotic neurons. Axons of cultured...
Cytoplasmic Dynein and Dynactin Are Required for the Transport of Microtubules into the Axon
Ahmad, Fridoon J., Echeverri, Christophe J., Vallee, Richard B., Baas, Peter W.
Previous work from our laboratory suggested that microtubules are released from the neuronal centrosome and then transported into the axon (Ahmad, F.J., and P.W. Baas. 1995. J. Cell Sci. 108:...
An Essential Role for Katanin in Severing Microtubules in the Neuron
Ahmad, Fridoon J., Yu, Wenqian, McNally, Francis J., Baas, Peter W.
Several lines of evidence suggest that microtubules are nucleated at the neuronal centrosome, and then released for transport into axons and dendrites. Here we sought to determine whether the...
Yu, Wenqian, Sharp, David J., Kuriyama, Ryoko, Mallik, Prabhat, Baas, Peter W.
Microtubules in the axon are uniformly oriented, while microtubules in the dendrite are nonuniformly oriented. We have proposed that these distinct microtubule polarity patterns may arise from a...
Identification of a Microtubule-associated Motor Protein Essential for Dendritic Differentiation
Sharp, David J., Yu, Wenqian, Ferhat, Lotfi, Kuriyama, Ryoko, Rueger, David C., Baas, Peter W.
The quintessential feature of the dendritic microtubule array is its nonuniform pattern of polarity orientation. During the development of the dendrite, a population of plus end–distal microtubules...
Yu, Wenqian, Qiang, Liang, Solowska, Joanna M., Karabay, Arzu, Korulu, Sirin, Baas, Peter W.
Neurons express two different microtubule-severing proteins, namely P60-katanin and spastin. Here, we performed studies on cultured neurons to ascertain whether these two proteins participate...