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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2012 Jun 1.
Published in final edited form as: Curr Opin Cell Biol. 2011 Feb 4;23(3):293–301. doi: 10.1016/j.ceb.2011.01.002

Figure 1.

Figure 1

Structural highlights of NPCs and COP/clathrin coats. (A) A 3D-reconstruction (left) or a central cross-section (right) of the NPC structure acquired by cryo-EM tomography using Xenopus NPCs. Note the characteristic 8-fold symmetry of the NPC. The image is adapted from [10•]. CP, central plug; SR, spoke ring complex; NM, nuclear membrane; LC, luminal connection; ALD, additional luminal density. (B) Surface views of the nuclear (left) and the cytoplasmic sides (right) of Xenopus NPC acquired using high-resolution scanning EM. The images highlight the nuclear basket (NB), cytoplasmic filaments (CF) and the central plug (CP). These structures are not clearly visible with cryo-EM tomography (Fig. 1A) due to their dynamic nature. Images were kindly provided by Dr. Elena Kiseleva. (C) Architecture of the COPII coat visualized by EM single particle reconstruction. Note the spherical architecture and highly symmetrical arrangement of coatomers within the coat structure (adapted from [30]).