The distribution, ultrastructure, and chemistry of microfilaments in cultured chick embryo fibroblasts were studied by thin sectioning of flat-embedded untreated and glycerol-extracted cells, histochemical and immunological electron microscopic procedures, and the negative staining of cells cultured on electron microscopic grids. In these cultured cells, the microfilaments are arranged into thick bundles that are disposed longitudinally and in looser arrangements in the fusiform-shaped cells. In the latter case, they are concentrated along the margins of the flattened cell, on the dorsal surface, and particularly at the ends of the cell and its ventral surface, where contact is made with the plastic dish or with other cells. Extracellular filaments, presumably originating from within the cell, are found at these points of contact. The microfilaments are composed in part of an actin-like protein. These filaments are between 70 and 90 Å in diameter, they are stable in 50% glycerol, they have an endogenous ATPase (myosin-like?) associated with them, they bind rabbit muscle heavy meromyosin, and they specifically bind antibody directed against isolated actin-like protein. In the cultured chick embryo fibroblasts, the microfilaments are essential for the establishment and maintenance of form, and they are probably critical elements for adhesion and motility. The microfilaments might also serve as stabilizers of intramembranous particle fluidity.
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1 August 1973
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August 01 1973
THE DISTRIBUTION, ULTRASTRUCTURE, AND CHEMISTRY OF MICROFILAMENTS IN CULTURED CHICK EMBRYO FIBROBLASTS
J. F. Perdue
J. F. Perdue
From the McArdle Laboratory for Cancer Research, University of Wisconsin Medical School, Madison, Wisconsin 53706
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J. F. Perdue
From the McArdle Laboratory for Cancer Research, University of Wisconsin Medical School, Madison, Wisconsin 53706
Received:
October 17 1972
Revision Received:
April 06 1973
Online ISSN: 1540-8140
Print ISSN: 0021-9525
Copyright © 1973 by The Rockefeller University Press
1973
J Cell Biol (1973) 58 (2): 265–283.
Article history
Received:
October 17 1972
Revision Received:
April 06 1973
Citation
J. F. Perdue; THE DISTRIBUTION, ULTRASTRUCTURE, AND CHEMISTRY OF MICROFILAMENTS IN CULTURED CHICK EMBRYO FIBROBLASTS . J Cell Biol 1 August 1973; 58 (2): 265–283. doi: https://doi.org/10.1083/jcb.58.2.265
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