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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2015 Apr 8.
Published in final edited form as: Structure. 2014 Apr 8;22(4):509–510. doi: 10.1016/j.str.2014.03.007

Figure 1.

Figure 1

Comparison of architecture for the three-stranded PhuZ cytomotive filament and the microtubule. (The figure is not intended to show a typical assembly/disassembly stage but a mixture, in order to display how the building blocks are added to or removed from the ends). The middle of the figure displays the eukaryotic tubulin dimer (on the left, PDB ID: 1JFF) and the PhuZ tubulin monomer (on the right, PDB ID: 3R4V). The C-terminal regions are marked in green. For eukaryotic tubulins polymerized in the microtubule, the C-terminal regions face outwards and are exposed to the environment. For PhuZ subunits polymerized in the three-stranded filaments, the C-terminal regions face inside and are responsible for both the intra-protofilament and inter-protofilament interactions. The tight or loose springs of the PhuZ tubulin subunits represent the compacted or extended forms, respectively.