But MT breakage is relatively infrequent in cells suggesting that intracellular factors may help boost MT resilience. To test this, we performed buckling assays in presence of HEK293 cell lysates and found enhanced MT survival. 🧵(6/9)

Interestingly, we also found that buckling MTs break (predominantly at points of high curvature) even in the presence of free tubulin indicating that buckling poses a mechanical challenge that can't be balanced by intrinsic self- repair alone. 🧵 (5/9)

We set out to bend and buckle microtubules dynamically ( as seen in cells) invitro and reproduced MT behaviours typically seen in cells, in vitro. 🧵(3/9)

Despite their high rigidity, microtubules (MTs) dynamically bend and buckle in cells. MT-self repair is inherent to their metastable nature, but it remains unclear whether just inherent repair mechanisms are sufficient to maintain MT integrity🧵 (1/9)
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...