Kinetics of Formation and Asymmetrical Distribution of Hsp104-Bound Protein Aggregates in Yeast.

Budding yeast cells have a finite replicative life span; that is, a mother cell produces only a limited number of daughter cells before it slows division and dies. Despite the gradual aging of the mother cell, all daughters are born rejuvenated and enjoy a full replicative lifespan. It has been proposed that entry of mother cells into senescence is driven by the progressive accumulation and retention of damaged material, including protein aggregates.

Two routes to senescence revealed by real-time analysis of telomerase-negative single lineages.

In eukaryotes, telomeres cap chromosome ends to maintain genomic stability. Failure to maintain telomeres leads to their progressive erosion and eventually triggers replicative senescence, a pathway that protects against unrestricted cell proliferation. However, the mechanisms underlying the variability and dynamics of this pathway are still elusive.

Aging yeast cells undergo a sharp entry into senescence unrelated to the loss of mitochondrial membrane potential.

In budding yeast, a mother cell can produce a finite number of daughter cells before it stops dividing and dies. Such entry into senescence is thought to result from a progressive decline in physiological function, including a loss of mitochondrial membrane potential (ΔΨ). Here, we developed a microfluidic device to monitor the dynamics of cell division and ΔΨ in real time at single-cell resolution.

Pulse propagation by a capacitive mechanism drives embryonic blood flow.

Pulsatile flow is a universal feature of the blood circulatory system in vertebrates and can lead to diseases when abnormal. In the embryo, blood flow forces stimulate vessel remodeling and stem cell proliferation. At these early stages, when vessels lack muscle cells, the heart is valveless and the Reynolds number (Re) is low, few details are available regarding the mechanisms controlling pulses propagation in the developing vascular network.

PTEN controls junction lengthening and stability during cell rearrangement in epithelial tissue.

Planar cell rearrangements control epithelial tissue morphogenesis and cellular pattern formation. They lead to the formation of new junctions whose length and stability determine the cellular pattern of tissues. Here, we show that during Drosophila wing development the loss of the tumor suppressor PTEN disrupts cell rearrangements by preventing the lengthening of newly formed junctions that become unstable and keep on rearranging.