The MIA complex is a conserved and novel dynein regulator essential for normal ciliary motility.

Axonemal dyneins must be precisely regulated and coordinated to produce ordered ciliary/flagellar motility, but how this is achieved is not understood. We analyzed two Chlamydomonas reinhardtii mutants, mia1 and mia2, which display slow swimming and low flagellar beat frequency. We found that the MIA1 and MIA2 genes encode conserved coiled-coil proteins, FAP100 and FAP73, respectively, which form the modifier of inner arms (MIA) complex in flagella. Cryo-electron tomography of mia mutant axonemes revealed that the MIA complex was located immediately distal to the intermediate/light chain complex of I1 dynein and structurally appeared to connect with the nexin-dynein regulatory complex. In axonemes from mutants that lack both the outer dynein arms and the MIA complex, I1 dynein failed to assemble, suggesting physical interactions between these three axonemal complexes and a role for the MIA complex in the stable assembly of I1 dynein. The MIA complex appears to regulate I1 dynein and possibly outer arm dyneins, which are both essential for normal motility.

Structures of SAS-6 suggest its organization in centrioles.

Centrioles are cylindrical, ninefold symmetrical structures with peripheral triplet microtubules strictly required to template cilia and flagella. The highly conserved protein SAS-6 constitutes the center of the cartwheel assembly that scaffolds centrioles early in their biogenesis. We determined the x-ray structure of the amino-terminal domain of SAS-6 from zebrafish, and we show that recombinant SAS-6 self-associates in vitro into assemblies that resemble cartwheel centers. Point mutations are consistent with the notion that centriole formation in vivo depends on the interactions that define the self-assemblies observed here. Thus, these interactions are probably essential to the structural organization of cartwheel centers.

IC97 is a novel intermediate chain of I1 dynein that interacts with tubulin and regulates interdoublet sliding.

Our goal is to understand the assembly and regulation of flagellar dyneins, particularly the Chlamydomonas inner arm dynein called I1 dynein. Here, we focus on the uncharacterized I1-dynein IC IC97. The IC97 gene encodes a novel IC without notable structural domains. IC97 shares homology with the murine lung adenoma susceptibility 1 (Las1) protein--a candidate tumor suppressor gene implicated in lung tumorigenesis. Multiple, independent biochemical assays determined that IC97 interacts with both alpha- and beta-tubulin subunits within the axoneme. I1-dynein assembly mutants suggest that IC97 interacts with both the IC138 and IC140 subunits within the I1-dynein motor complex and that IC97 is part of a regulatory complex that contains IC138. Microtubule sliding assays, using axonemes containing I1 dynein but devoid of IC97, show reduced microtubule sliding velocities that are not rescued by kinase inhibitors, revealing a critical role for IC97 in I1-dynein function and control of dynein-driven motility.

Systematic comparison of in vitro motile properties between Chlamydomonas wild-type and mutant outer arm dyneins each lacking one of the three heavy chains.

Outer arm dynein (OAD) of cilia and flagella contains two or three distinct heavy chains, each having a motor function. To elucidate their functional difference, we compared the in vitro motile properties of Chlamydomonas wild-type OAD containing the alpha, beta, and gamma heavy chains and three kinds of mutant OADs, each lacking one of the three heavy chains. For systematic comparison, a method was developed to introduce a biotin tag into a subunit, LC2, which served as the specific anchoring site on an avidin-coated glass surface. Wild-type OAD displayed microtubule gliding in the presence of ATP and ADP, with a maximal velocity of 5.0 mum/s, which is approximately 1/4 of the microtubule sliding velocity in the axoneme. The duty ratio was estimated to be as low as 0.08. The absence of the beta heavy chain lowered both the gliding velocity and ATPase activity, whereas the absence of the gamma heavy chain increased both activities. Strikingly, the absence of the alpha heavy chain lowered the gliding velocity but increased the ATPase activity. Thus, the three heavy chains are likely to play distinct roles and regulate each other to achieve coordinated force production.

Novel 44-kilodalton subunit of axonemal Dynein conserved from chlamydomonas to mammals.

Cilia and flagella have multiple dyneins in their inner and outer arms. Chlamydomonas inner-arm dynein contains at least seven major subspecies (dynein a to dynein g), of which all but dynein f (also called dynein I1) are the single-headed type that are composed of a single heavy chain, actin, and either centrin or a 28-kDa protein (p28). Dynein d was found to associate with two additional proteins of 38 kDa (p38) and 44 kDa (p44). Following the characterization of the p38 protein (R. Yamamoto, H. A. Yanagisawa, T. Yagi, and R. Kamiya, FEBS Lett. 580:6357-6360, 2006), we have identified p44 as a novel component of dynein d by using an immunoprecipitation approach. p44 is present along the length of the axonemes and is diminished, but not absent, in the ida4 and ida5 mutants, both lacking this dynein. In the ida5 axoneme, p44 and p38 appear to form a complex, suggesting that they constitute the docking site of dynein d on the outer doublet. p44 has potential homologues in other ciliated organisms. For example, the mouse homologue of p44, NYD-SP14, was found to be strongly expressed in tissues with motile cilia and flagella. These results suggest that inner-arm dynein d and its subunit organization are widely conserved.

A novel subunit of axonemal dynein conserved among lower and higher eukaryotes.

To elucidate the subunit composition of axonemal inner-arm dynein, we examined a 38 kDa protein (p38) co-purified with a Chlamydomonas inner arm subspecies, dynein d. We found it is a novel protein conserved among a variety of organisms with motile cilia and flagella. Immunoprecipitation using specific antibody verified its association with a heavy chain, actin and a previously identified light chain (p28). Unexpectedly, mutant axonemes lacking dynein d and other dyneins retained reduced amounts of p38. This finding suggests that p38 is involved in the docking of dynein d to specific loci.

A tektin homologue is decreased in chlamydomonas mutants lacking an axonemal inner-arm dynein.

In ciliary and flagellar axonemes, various discrete structures such as inner and outer dynein arms are regularly arranged on the outer doublet microtubules. Little is known about the basis for their regular arrangement. In this study, proteins involved in the attachment of inner-arm dyneins were searched by a microtubule overlay assay on Chlamydomonas mutant axonemes. A 58-kDa protein (p58) was found approximately 80% diminished in the mutants ida6 and pf3, both lacking one (species e) of the seven inner-arm species (a-g). Analysis of its cDNA indicated that p58 is homologous to tektin, a protein that was originally found in sea urchin and thought to be crucial for the longitudinal periodicity of the doublet microtubule. Unlike sea urchin tektin, which is a component of protofilament ribbons that occur after Sarkosyl treatment of axonemes, p58 was not contained in similar Sarkosyl-resistant ribbons from Chlamydomonas axonemes. Immunofluorescence microscopy showed that p58 was localized uniformly along the axoneme and on the basal body. The p58 signal was reduced in ida6 and pf3. These results suggest that a reduced amount of p58 is sufficient for the production of outer doublets, whereas an additional amount of it is involved in inner-arm dynein attachment.

Rescue of a Chlamydomonas inner-arm-dynein-deficient mutant by electroporation-mediated delivery of recombinant p28 light chain.

We have recently shown that rabbit actin can be introduced by electroporation into the Chlamydomonas ida5 mutant lacking conventional actin and rescue its mutant phenotype [Hayashi et al., 2001: Cell Motil. Cytoskeleton 49:146-153]. In this study, we explored the possibility of using electroporation for functional assay of a recombinant protein. The p28 light chain of inner-arm dyneins was expressed in Escherichia coli, purified to homogeneity, and introduced by electroporation into a non-motile mutant ida4oda6 that lacks it. Because this protein was insoluble in the low ionic strength solution used in the previous study, electroporation was performed at physiological ionic strength in the presence of Ca(2+). Most cells shed their flagella after electroporation. Reflagellation took place within 3 h and up to 30% of the cells became motile, indicating that the introduced p28 retained its functional activity. Fluorescently-labeled p28 was equally effective; in this case fluorescence was observed along the flagella. The presence of Ca(2+) and deflagellation appeared to be important for efficient protein delivery, because a triple mutant with the fa1 mutation deficient in the flagellar shedding mechanism recovered motility only very poorly. Similar results were obtained with other combinations of recombinant proteins and mutants. This study thus demonstrates the feasibility of using electroporation for activity assays of recombinant proteins.