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Elsevier, Current Opinion in Cell Biology, 1(22), p. 96-103, 2010

DOI: 10.1016/j.ceb.2009.11.001

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Microtubule severing enzymes

Journal article published in 2009 by Antonina Roll-Mecak ORCID, Francis J. McNally
This paper is available in a repository.
This paper is available in a repository.

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Abstract

In 1993, an enzyme with an ATP-dependent microtubule-severing activity was purified from sea urchin eggs and named katanin, after the Japanese word for sword. Now we know that katanin, spastin, and fidgetin form a family of closely related microtubule-severing enzymes that is widely distributed in eukaryotes ranging from Tetrahymena and Chlamydomonas to humans. Here we review the diverse in vivo functions of these proteins and the recent significant advances in deciphering the biophysical mechanism of microtubule severing.