C. elegans mitosis control with thermosensitive mutants

Introduction

During C. elegans embryo division, the CYK-4 protein is required for the completion of cytokinesis (but not to form a furrow or initiate ingression). At the “permissive” 16°C temperature, the CYK-4 protein is functional but over 25°C it becomes inactivated. Such a mutant is called “thermosensitive”.

Fig 1: CYK-4 ts C. elegans control of cytokinesis by ElveflowTemp. When temperature is set to 16°C, cell division goes on normally (a-f). Immediately after quick change of temperature (25°C) the CYK-4 protein is inactivated resulting in cytokinesis arrest.

ElveflowTemp-induced division phenotype

During our experimentation, C. elegans thermosensitive embryo mutants (CYK-4 ts) were examined under the microscope with a ElveflowTemp platform. This system allowed to selectively modify the temperature of the embryo samples between 16°C and 25°C resulting in cytokinesis blocking. Fig 1 shows unprecedently observed phenomenon during cell division.

ElveflowTemp offers unique properties to get the best tuning of C.elegans samples temperature and obtain results that could not be observed otherwise!