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Published on: August 26, 2016
Filamentous Bacteria as Targets to Study Phagocytosis
Akriti Prashar1, Sana I S Khan1, Mauricio R Terebiznik2
1Department of Biological Sciences, University of Toronto Scarborough, 1265 Military Trail, Toronto, ON, Canada, M1C 1A4.
Abstract:
Filamentous targets are internalized via phagocytic cups that last for several minutes before closing to form a phagosome. This characteristic offers the possibility to study key events in phagocytosis with greater spatial and temporal resolution than is possible to achieve using spherical particles, for which the transition from a phagocytic cup to an enclosed phagosome occurs within a few seconds after particle attachment. In this chapter, we provide methodologies to prepare filamentous bacteria and describe how they can be used as targets to study different aspects of phagocytosis.
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