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Myosin V is a left-handed spiral motor on the right-handed actin helix

Nature Structural Biology volume 9, pages 464–467 (2002)Cite this article

Abstract

Myosin V is a two-headed, actin-based molecular motor implicated in organelle transport. Previously, a single myosin V molecule has been shown to move processively along an actin filament in discrete ∼36 nm steps. However, 36nm is the helical repeat length of actin, and the geometry of the previous experiments may have forced the heads to bind to, or halt at, sites on one side of actin that are separated by 36 nm. To observe unconstrained motion, we suspended an actin filament in solution and attached a single myosin V molecule carrying a bead duplex. The duplex moved as a left-handed spiral around the filament, disregarding the right-handed actin helix. Our results indicate a stepwise walking mechanism in which myosin V positions and orients the unbound head such that the head will land at the 11th or 13th actin subunit on the opposing strand of the actin double helix.

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Figure 1: Experimental design.
Figure 2: Spiral motion of myosin V around an actin filament at 400 μM ATP.
Figure 3: Correlations between displacement and rotation.
Figure 4: Interpretation of the left-handed rotation.

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Acknowledgements

We thank R. Yasuda, H. Noji, T. Nishizaka, Y. Harada and T. Nishinaka for discussion; L.B. Roksana, K. Kawashima, K. Yogo, R. Shimo, J. Yamaguchi and H. Kubota for sample preparation; M. Shio for microscope setup and H. Umezawa for laboratory management. M.Y.A. was a research fellow of the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science. This work was supported in part by Grants-in-Aid from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology of Japan.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Center for Integrative Bioscience, Okazaki National Research Institutes, Higashiyama 5-1, Myodaiji, Okazaki, 444-8585, Japan

    M. Yusuf Ali, Kengo Adachi & Kazuhiko Kinosita Jr

  2. CREST (Core Research for Evolutional Science and Technology), 'Genetic Programming' Team 13, Nogawa 907, Miyamae-ku, Kawasaki, 216-0001, Japan

    M. Yusuf Ali, Kengo Adachi, Hiroyasu Itoh, Kazuhiko Kinosita Jr & Shin'ichi Ishiwata

  3. Department of Physics, Faculty of Science and Technology, Keio University, Hiyoshi 3-14-1, Kohoku-ku, Yokohama, 223-8522, Japan

    M. Yusuf Ali & Kazuhiko Kinosita Jr

  4. Department of Physics, School of Science and Engineering, Waseda University, Okubo 3-4-1, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo, 169-8555, Japan

    Sotaro Uemura & Shin'ichi Ishiwata

  5. Tsukuba Research Laboratory, Hamamatsu Photonics KK, Tokodai, Tsukuba, 300-2635, Japan

    Hiroyasu Itoh

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  1. M. Yusuf Ali
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Correspondence to Kazuhiko Kinosita Jr.

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Ali, M., Uemura, S., Adachi, K. et al. Myosin V is a left-handed spiral motor on the right-handed actin helix. Nat Struct Mol Biol 9, 464–467 (2002). https://doi.org/10.1038/nsb803

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