Rotary Nanomotors in the Rear View Mirror

Rotation is part of our everyday lives. For most of human history, rotation was considered a uniquely human invention, something beyond the anatomical capabilities of organisms. In 1973, Howard Berg made the audacious proposal that the common gut bacterium swims by rotating helical flagellar filamen...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inFrontiers in microbiology Vol. 13; p. 873573
Main Author Manson, Michael D
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Switzerland Frontiers Media S.A 29.04.2022
Subjects
flagellum
Howard Berg
ion motive force
Microbiology
motor
rotation
motor
Howard Berg
flagellum
rotation
ion motive force
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Summary:Rotation is part of our everyday lives. For most of human history, rotation was considered a uniquely human invention, something beyond the anatomical capabilities of organisms. In 1973, Howard Berg made the audacious proposal that the common gut bacterium swims by rotating helical flagellar filaments. In 1987, Paul Boyer suggested that the FoF1 ATP synthase of is also a rotary device. Now we know that rotating nanomachines evolved independently at least three times. They power a wide variety of cellular processes. Here, the study of flagellar rotation in is briefly summarized. In 2020, the Cryo-EM structure of the MotAB stator element of the bacterial flagellum was described. The structure strongly suggests that the MotAB stator rotates to drive flagellar rotation. Similar motors are coupled to other diverse processes. The following articles in this issue review the current knowledge and speculation about rotating biological nanomachines.
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Reviewed by: Marie-stephanie Aschtgen, Karolinska Institutet (KI), Sweden; Daisuke Nakane, The University of Electro-Communications, Japan
This article was submitted to Microbial Physiology and Metabolism, a section of the journal Frontiers in Microbiology
Edited by: Stanley Brul, University of Amsterdam, Netherlands
ISSN:1664-302X
1664-302X
DOI:10.3389/fmicb.2022.873573