PMID:21533050

Citation	Ai, E, Poole, DS and Skop, AR (2011) Long astral microtubules and RACK-1 stabilize polarity domains during maintenance phase in Caenorhabditis elegans embryos. PLoS ONE 6:e19020
Abstract	Cell polarity is a very well conserved process important for cell differentiation, cell migration, and embryonic development. After the establishment of distinct cortical domains, polarity cues have to be stabilized and maintained within a fluid and dynamic membrane to achieve proper cell asymmetry. Microtubules have long been thought to deliver the signals required to polarize a cell. While previous studies suggest that microtubules play a key role in the establishment of polarity, the requirement of microtubules during maintenance phase remains unclear. In this study, we show that depletion of Caenorhabditis elegans RACK-1, which leads to short astral microtubules during prometaphase, specifically affects maintenance of cortical PAR domains and Dynamin localization. We then investigated the consequence of knocking down other factors that also abolish astral microtubule elongation during polarity maintenance phase. We found a correlation between short astral microtubules and the instability of PAR-6 and PAR-2 domains during maintenance phase. Our data support a necessary role for astral microtubules in the maintenance phase of cell polarity.
Links	PubMed PMC3080402 Online version:10.1371/journal.pone.0019020
Keywords	Animals; Body Patterning; Caenorhabditis elegans/embryology; Caenorhabditis elegans/metabolism; Caenorhabditis elegans Proteins/metabolism; Caenorhabditis elegans Proteins/physiology; Cell Polarity/physiology; Dynamins/metabolism; Fluorescence; Metaphase; Microtubules/physiology; RNA Interference; Receptors, Cytoplasmic and Nuclear/physiology
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