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BP: Fachverband Biologische Physik
BP 28: Poster Session II
BP 28.24: Poster
Donnerstag, 30. März 2023, 18:00–20:00, P2/EG
Influence of vimentin intermediate filaments on microtubules in cells — •Anna Blob1, Roman David Ventzke1,2, Thomas Giacomo Nies2, Axel Munk2, Laura Schaedel3, and Sarah Köster1 — 1Institute for X-Ray Physics, University of Göttingen — 2Institute for Mathematical Stochastics, University of Göttingen — 3Center for Biophysics, Saarland University
The cytoskeleton in eucaryotic cells is an intricate network of three different filamentous proteins: microtubules, actin filaments and intermediate filaments. They are essential for the mechanical properties of a cell as well as intracellular transport and division. Each filament type has its own unique features, and, in particular, microtubules, can withstand large compressive forces and show characteristic buckling and bending behavior that is still not fully understood. There is evidence for important interactions between cytoskeletal filaments: vimentin intermediate filaments stabilize microtubules in vitro and can template the microtubule network in migrating cells. Following up on this idea, we are interested in the influence of vimentin networks on microtubule mechanics. Investigating how the bending of microtubules depends on both the microtubule network itself and the vimentin network will improve our understanding of the mechanical consequences of the interaction within and between these filament systems. We compare microtubule networks in vimentin-knockout and wildtype mouse fibroblasts on micropatterns. We find that the local curvature of microtubules depends on the cellular region and increases with both increasing microtubule density and increasing vimentin density.