There is no author summary for this article yet. Authors can add summaries to their articles on ScienceOpen to make them more accessible to a non-specialist audience.
Abstract
Little is known about the mechanism of mitochondrial division. We show here that mitochondria
are disrupted by mutations in a C. elegans dynamin-related protein (DRP-1). Mutant
DRP-1 causes the mitochondrial matrix to retract into large blebs that are both surrounded
and connected by tubules of outer membrane. This indicates that scission of the mitochondrial
outer membrane is inhibited, while scission of the inner membrane still occurs. Overexpressed
wild-type DRP-1 causes mitochondria to become excessively fragmented, consistent with
an active role in mitochondrial scission. DRP-1 fused to GFP is observed in spots
on mitochondria where scission eventually occurs. These data indicate that wild-type
DRP-1 contributes to the final stages of mitochondrial division by controlling scission
of the mitochondrial outer membrane.