Anisotropic elastic properties of microtubules

Abstract

We review and model the experimental parameters which characterize elastic properties of microtubules. Three macroscopic estimates are made of the anisotropic elastic moduli, accounting for the molecular forces between tubulin dimers: for a longitudinal compression of a microtubule, for a lateral force and for a shearing force. These estimates reflect the anisotropies in these parameters observed in several recent experiments.

Immunogold method evidences that kinesin and myosin bind to and couple microtubules and actin filaments in lipotubuloids of Ornithogalum umbellatum ovary epidermis

“…Flexibility of microtubules connected with the fact that microtubule subunits are bound more strongly inter-protofilaments than within-protofilaments in vitro was shown by many authors (Chrétien et al 1998;Nogales 1999;Nogales et al 1999;Löwe et al 2001;Meurer-Grob et al 2001;Kis et al 2002;Sept et al 2003;Krebs et al 2005;Tuszyński et al 2005;Wang and Nogales 2005;Nogales and Wang 2006;Drabik et al 2007;Hunyadi and Jánosi 2007).…”

Coupled oscillations of a protein microtubule immersed in cytoplasm: an orthotropic elastic shell modeling

“…This work was possible owing to a recently obtained experimental and numerical body of data coming from several groups and describing a number of physical and structural properties of the microtubule and the cytoplasm [18,19,25,30,33]. A first-order shear deformation shell theory for orthotropic materials was developed for microtubules to predict the coupled frequencies of the microtubule-cytoplasm system.…”

“…The boundary value problem (19)(20)(21)(22) is solved analytically by using the Michell solution [27] to determine the stream function ψ as…”

“…Since the value of the shear modulus G xθ of microtubules ranges from 1 KPa to 1 MPa in Fig. 6 The dependence of the microtubule frequency on The shear modulus with n = 1, E x = 1 GPa, E θ = 1 MPa, G xθ = 1 MPa, ξ = 0 and μ = 0; a torsional mode and b longitudinal mode the literature [19,33,34], it is necessary to examine its effect on microtubule frequencies. The torsional frequencies for a typical microtubule with E x = 1 GPa, E θ = 1 MPa, ξ = 0 and μ = 0 are plotted in Fig.…”

“…Moreover, in some previous works, the microtubules have been modeled as isotropic tubes with a single Young's modulus and being temperature-independent. However, experiments show that the microtubules are strongly anisotropic, whereas the longitudinal bonds between the tubulin dimers are much stiffer and stronger than the lateral bonds [19]. Therefore, the coupled effect of the microtubule-cytoplasm system and anisotropic properties of the microtubule have to be taken into account in vibration analysis of the microtubules.…”