Actin (green) and ADF/cofilin (red) are disorganized in the absence of tropomyosin (bottom).
Previously, the authors found that worms with mutations in a muscle-specific ADF/cofilin isoform could not assemble normal myofibrils. ADF/cofilin appears to increase actin turnover, but myofibrils are highly stable structures, suggesting that some additional factor must inhibit ADF/cofilin in order to stabilize the myofibrils. The new study demonstrates that purified tropomyosin and ADF/cofilin compete for binding to purified F-actin, and that ADF/cofilin cannot bind to isolated myofibrils unless the attached tropomyosin is removed from the myofibrils first. RNAi suppression of tropomyosin disrupts myofibril organization in wild-type worms, but not in ADF/cofilin mutant worms. The results suggest that in vivo tropomyosin preserves myofilaments by blocking the destabilizing effects of ADF/cofilin. ▪