Anomalous and heterogeneous DNA transport in biomimetic cytoskeleton networks

Abstract

<p>The cytoskeleton, a complex network of protein filaments and crosslinking proteins, dictates diverse cellular processes ranging from division to cargo transport.</p>

Subtle changes in crosslinking drive diverse anomalous transport characteristics in actin-microtubule networks

“…The decay length (Δ ), is therefore best understood as the mean of length scales associated with the various relaxation processes that contribute to the exponential tails in the distributions. Moreover, this characteristic length has been shown to exhibit a power-law dependence on lag time with exponents of ~1/4 -1/3 14,52 . To ascertain whether or not this decay length is sensitive to crosslinking motif, we plot (Δ ) against lag time and fit these curves to a power law, ~Δ Ω (Fig.…”

“…Finally, our measurement approaches, comprehensive suite of metrics, and well-characterized and controlled actinmicrotubule composites serve as much-needed platforms for screening the transport properties of a wide array of tracer particles and network architectures. and 0.05% Tween to a final protein concentration of c = 5.8 μM, as described previously 14,43,44,55 .…”

“…The cytoskeleton is a complex network of filamentous proteins, including semiflexible actin filaments and rigid microtubules [1][2][3] . Numerous crosslinking proteins that can link actin to actin 4-7 , microtubules to microtubules [8][9][10] , and actin to microtubules [11][12][13][14][15] enable the cytoskeleton to adopt diverse architectures and stiffnesses to drive key processes such as cell motility, meiosis and apoptosis 10,[16][17][18] . These varying structural and rheological properties, in turn, directly impact the intracellular transport of vesicles and macromolecules traversing the cytoplasm 14,15,19,20 .…”

“…More generally, thermal transport of particles in biomimetic, cell-like and crowded environments continues to be intensely investigated due to the intriguing anomalous properties, i.e. properties not found in normal Brownian motion 14,15,[19][20][21][22][23][24] , that have been reported in these systems.…”

Subtle changes in crosslinking drive diverse anomalous transport characteristics in actin-microtubule networks

“…The cytoskeleton is a complex network of filamentous proteins, including semiflexible actin filaments and rigid microtubules [1][2][3] . Numerous crosslinking proteins that can link actin to actin 4-7 , microtubules to microtubules [8][9][10] , and actin to microtubules [11][12][13][14][15] enable the cytoskeleton to adopt diverse architectures and stiffnesses to drive key processes such as cell motility, meiosis and apoptosis 10,[16][17][18] . These varying structural and rheological properties, in turn, directly impact the intracellular transport of vesicles and macromolecules traversing the cytoplasm 14,15,19,20 .…”