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. 2022 Nov 30;18(11):e1010489. doi: 10.1371/journal.pgen.1010489

Fig 8. Model of acentrosomal pole coalescence and stability provided by ZYG-9.

Fig 8

(A) ZYG-9 is required to establish and maintain acentrosomal pole stability during meiosis. Removal of ZYG-9 prior to spindle assembly prevents multipolar spindles from stably coalescing into bipolar spindles. Additionally, removing ZYG-9 from stable bipolar spindles causes splaying of microtubule bundles near chromosomes and fragmentation of acentrosomal poles, ultimately causing the spindle to lose bipolarity and revert to a multipolar state. (B) Removal of ZYG-9 from a monopolar spindle causes no obvious defects to spindle morphology or monopole stability, suggesting that ZYG-9’s role in spindle bipolarity is not tied directly to acentrosomal poles. (C) Model: ZYG-9 is required for proper microtubule dynamics within the acentrosomal spindle, which is critical for the organization of tiled microtubules into stable bundles via microtubule motors/MAPs. Removal of ZYG-9 leads to defects in microtubule stabilization, leading to rapid splitting of acentrosomal poles, splaying of midspindle microtubule bundles, and loss of spindle bipolarity.