Publications by authors named "Keiko Shoda"

We cloned and characterized two new coral fluorescent proteins: h2-3 and 1-41. h2-3 formed an obligate dimeric complex and exhibited bright green fluorescence. On the other hand, 1-41 formed a highly multimeric complex and exhibited dim red fluorescence.

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The Golgi apparatus is a key station of glycosylation and membrane traffic. It consists of stacked cisternae in most eukaryotes. However, the mechanisms how the Golgi stacks are formed and maintained are still obscure.

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Crystallization of proteins may occur in the cytosol of a living cell, but how a cell responds to intracellular protein crystallization remains unknown. We developed a variant of coral fluorescent protein that forms diffraction-quality crystals within mammalian cells. This expression system allowed the direct determination of its crystal structure at 2.

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Although second harmonic generation (SHG) microscopy provides unique imaging advantages for voltage imaging and other biological applications, genetically-encoded SHG chromophores remain relatively unexplored. SHG only arises from non-centrosymmetric media, so an anisotropic arrangement of chromophores is essential to provide strong SHG signals. Here, inspired by the mechanism by which K-Ras4B associates with plasma membranes, we sought to achieve asymmetric arrangements of chromophores at the membrane-cytoplasm interface using the fluorescent protein mVenus.

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The Golgi apparatus forms stacks of cisternae in many eukaryotic cells. However, little is known about how such a stacked structure is formed and maintained. To address this question, plant cells provide a system suitable for live-imaging approaches because individual Golgi stacks are well separated in the cytoplasm.

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Organelle movement is essential for proper function of living cells. In plants, these movements generally depend on actin filaments, but the underlying mechanism is unknown. Here, in Arabidopsis, we identify associations of short actin filaments along the chloroplast periphery on the plasma membrane side associated with chloroplast photorelocation and anchoring to the plasma membrane.

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The SNARE complex is a key regulator of vesicular traffic, executing membrane fusion between transport vesicles or organelles and target membranes. A functional SNARE complex consists of four coiled-coil helical bundles, three of which are supplied by Q-SNAREs and another from an R-SNARE. Arabidopsis thaliana VAMP727 is an R-SNARE, with homologs only in seed plants.

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We previously showed that the ANGUSTIFOLIA (AN) gene regulates the width of leaves of Arabidopsis thaliana, by controlling the polar elongation of leaf cells. In the present study, we found that the abnormal arrangement of cortical microtubules (MTs) in an leaf cells appeared to account entirely for the abnormal shape of the cells. It suggested that the AN gene might regulate the polarity of cell growth by controlling the arrangement of cortical MTs.

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