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Updated: Jun 11, 2026

Self-Assembly of Microtubule Tactoids
Published on: June 23, 2022
Microtubule-assisted mechanism for functional metabolic macromolecular complex formation
Songon An1, Yijun Deng, John W Tomsho
1Department of Chemistry, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802, USA.
Abstract:
Evidence has been presented for a metabolic multienzyme complex, the purinosome, that participates in de novo purine biosynthesis to form clusters in the cytoplasm of living cells under purine-depleted conditions. Here we identified, using fluorescent live cell imaging, that a microtubule network appears to physically control the spatial distribution of purinosomes in the cytoplasm. Application of a cell-based assay measuring the rate of de novo purine biosynthesis confirmed that the metabolic activity of purinosomes was significantly suppressed in the absence of microtubules. Collectively, we propose a microtubule-assisted mechanism for functional purinosome formation in HeLa cells.
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