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  • Loss of a conserved MAPK causes catastrophic failure in assembly of a specialized cilium-like structure in Toxoplasma gondii
Title: Loss of a conserved MAPK causes catastrophic failure in assembly of a specialized cilium-like structure in Toxoplasma gondii
Primary cilia are important organizing centers that control diverse cellular processes. Apicomplexan parasites like Toxoplasma gondii have a specialized cilium-like structure called the conoid that organizes the secretory and invasion machinery critical for the parasites’ lifestyle. The proteins that initiate the biogenesis of this structure are largely unknown. We identified the Toxoplasma orthologue of the conserved kinase ERK7 as essential to conoid assembly. Parasites in which ERK7 has been depleted lose their conoids late during maturation and are immotile and thus unable to invade new host cells. This is the most severe phenotype to conoid biogenesis yet reported, and is made more striking by the fact that ERK7 is not a conoid protein, as it localizes just basal to the structure. ERK7 has been recently implicated in ciliogenesis in metazoan cells, and our data suggest that this kinase has an ancient and central role in regulating ciliogenesis throughout Eukaryota.  more » « less
Award ID(s):
1553334
NSF-PAR ID:
10211821
Author(s) / Creator(s):
; ; ; ;
Editor(s):
Chang, Fred
Date Published:
Journal Name:
Molecular Biology of the Cell
Volume:
31
Issue:
9
ISSN:
1059-1524
Page Range / eLocation ID:
881 to 888
Format(s):
Medium: X
Sponsoring Org:
National Science Foundation
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