Cytoskeleton: The many flavors of cilia transition fibers

Cilia are membrane-surrounded sensory cellular organelles that can also create motion to move fluids or propel the cell to which they are attached. New work shows that, whereas transition fibers are essential for cilia attachment to the membrane in most systems studied, transition fibers in Drosophila are only involved in cilia extension after docking. Cilia are membrane-surrounded sensory cellular organelles that can also create motion to move fluids or propel the cell to which they are attached. New work shows that, whereas transition fibers are essential for cilia attachment to the membrane in most systems studied, transition fibers in Drosophila are only involved in cilia extension after docking. Drosophila transition fibers are essential for IFT-dependent ciliary elongation but not basal body docking and ciliary buddingHou et al.Current BiologyJanuary 19, 2023In BriefHou et al. report that Fbf1, Cep89, and Cep164 are three conserved Drosophila transition fiber (TF) proteins and establish their assembly hierarchy. They demonstrate that Drosophila TFs play an evolutionarily conserved role in IFT-dependent axonemal elongation but a dispensable and thus divergent role in the initiation of ciliogenesis. Full-Text PDF