Figure 6. Linking cell wall integrity and chromosome morphology.

(A) A model illustrating the interaction between cell wall (green) and chromosome (red) in wild type and ΔmanA cells. Three generations of wild type (left panels) and ΔmanA (middle panels) cells are depicted. Corresponding fluorescence images of ΔmanA cells (right panels) are shown. (B) The cell wall lipid intermediate flip-flop reaction is an active mechanism for coordinating chromosome organization with cell wall elongation. Shown are chromosome (red), cell wall (green), cell wall lipid intermediates (blue) and membrane (gray). Chromosome and cell wall lipid intermediates undergo attaching/detaching cycles depending on the side of the membrane the lipid intermediates are present.