Structural and Computational Biology Unit, European Molecular Biology Laboratory, Meyerhofstrasse 1, 69117, Heidelberg, Germany.
Hamburg Unit c/o DESY, European Molecular Biology Laboratory, Center for Structural Systems Biology (CSSB), Notkestrasse 85, 22607, Hamburg, Germany.
Nat Commun. 2018 Jun 18;9(1):2361. doi: 10.1038/s41467-018-04739-y.
Nuclear pore complexes (NPCs) span the nuclear envelope and mediate nucleocytoplasmic exchange. They are a hallmark of eukaryotes and deeply rooted in the evolutionary origin of cellular compartmentalization. NPCs have an elaborate architecture that has been well studied in vertebrates. Whether this architecture is unique or varies significantly in other eukaryotic kingdoms remains unknown, predominantly due to missing in situ structural data. Here, we report the architecture of the algal NPC from the early branching eukaryote Chlamydomonas reinhardtii and compare it to the human NPC. We find that the inner ring of the Chlamydomonas NPC has an unexpectedly large diameter, and the outer rings exhibit an asymmetric oligomeric state that has not been observed or predicted previously. Our study provides evidence that the NPC is subject to substantial structural variation between species. The divergent and conserved features of NPC architecture provide insights into the evolution of the nucleocytoplasmic transport machinery.
核孔复合体（NPC）跨越核膜并介导核质交换。它们是真核生物的标志，深深植根于细胞区室化的进化起源中。NPC 具有精细的结构，在脊椎动物中得到了很好的研究。这种结构是否独特，或者在其他真核生物王国中是否有很大差异，目前尚不清楚，主要是因为缺少原位结构数据。在这里，我们报告了早期分支真核生物莱茵衣藻 NPC 的结构，并将其与人类 NPC 进行了比较。我们发现，衣藻 NPC 的内环具有出人意料的大直径，而外环表现出以前未观察到或预测到的不对称寡聚状态。我们的研究提供了证据，表明 NPC 在物种之间存在着很大的结构变异。NPC 结构的差异和保守特征为核质转运机制的进化提供了线索。
