Speckle microscopic evaluation of microtubule transport in growing nerve processes.

摘要: Assembly of microtubules is fundamental to neuronal morphogenesis. Microtubules typically form crosslinked bundles in nerve processes, precluding resolution single at the light microscopic level. Therefore, previous studies microtubule transport neurites have had rely on indirect approaches. Here we show that individual can be visualized directly axonal shafts Xenopus embryo neurons by using digital fluorescence microscopy. We find that, although array dynamic, are stationary relative substrate. These results argue against a model which newly synthesized tubulin transported down axon microtubules.