INTERMEDIATE FILAMENT ASSEMBLY - FIBRILLOGENESIS IS DRIVEN BY DECISIVE DIMER-DIMER INTERACTIONS

Intermediate filaments are built from one to several members of a mult igene family encoding fibrous proteins that share a highly conserved h ierarchic assembly plan for the formation of multistranded filaments f rom distinctly structured extended coiled coils. Despite the rather lo w primary sequence identity, intermediate filaments form apparently si milar filaments with regard to their spatial dimensions and physical p roperties, Over the past few years, substantial progress has been made in the elucidation of the complex expression patterns and clinically relevant phenotypes of intermediate filaments, The key question of how these filaments assemble and what the molecular architecture of their distinct assembly intermediates comprises, however, has still not bee n answered to the extent that has been achieved for microfilaments and microtubules.