Nature Communications (Sep 2020)

Photoswitchable paclitaxel-based microtubule stabilisers allow optical control over the microtubule cytoskeleton

  • Adrian Müller-Deku,
  • Joyce C. M. Meiring,
  • Kristina Loy,
  • Yvonne Kraus,
  • Constanze Heise,
  • Rebekkah Bingham,
  • Klara I. Jansen,
  • Xiaoyi Qu,
  • Francesca Bartolini,
  • Lukas C. Kapitein,
  • Anna Akhmanova,
  • Julia Ahlfeld,
  • Dirk Trauner,
  • Oliver Thorn-Seshold

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-18389-6
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 11, no. 1
pp. 1 – 12

Abstract

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Light-based modulation of the microtubule (MT) cytoskeleton is an attractive goal for spatiotemporally-resolved MT studies. Here the authors develop a first generation photoswitchable small molecule MT stabiliser based on paclitaxel, allowing optical control over cellular MT dynamics.