Transport of material within cells is mediated by trafficking vesicles that bud from one cellular compartment and fuse with another. Formation of a trafficking vesicle is driven by membrane coats that localize cargo and polymerize into cages to bend the membrane. Although extensive structural information is available for components of these coats, the heterogeneity of trafficking vesicles has prevented an understanding of how complete membrane coats assemble on the membrane. We combined cryo-electron tomography, subtomogram averaging, and cross-linking mass spectrometry to derive a complete model of the assembled coat protein complex I (COPI) coat involved in traffic between the Golgi and the endoplasmic reticulum. The highly interconnected COPI coat structure contradicted the current "adaptor-and-cage" understanding of coated vesicle formation.

Dimerization of the small GTPase Arf is prerequisite for the scission of COPI-coated transport vesicles. Here, we quantify the monomer/dimer equilibrium of Arf within the membrane and show that after membrane scission, Arf dimers are restricted to donor membranes. By hydrogen exchange mass spectrometry, we define the interface of activated dimeric Arf within its switch II region. Single amino acid exchanges in this region reduce the propensity of Arf to dimerize. We suggest a mechanism of membrane scission by which the dimeric form of Arf is segregated to the donor membrane. Our data are consistent with the previously reported absence of dimerized Arf in COPI vesicles and could explain the presence of one single scar-like noncoated region in each COPI vesicle.

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