Structure of a kinesin-tubulin complex and implications for kinesin motility.
Gigant, B., Wang, W., Dreier, B., Jiang, Q., Pecqueur, L., Pluckthun, A., Wang, C., Knossow, M.(2013) Nat Struct Mol Biol 20: 1001-1007
- PubMed: 23872990 
- DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nsmb.2624
- Primary Citation of Related Structures:  
4HNA - PubMed Abstract: 
The typical function of kinesins is to transport cargo along microtubules. Binding of ATP to microtubule-attached motile kinesins leads to cargo displacement. To better understand the nature of the conformational changes that lead to the power stroke that moves a kinesin's load along a microtubule, we determined the X-ray structure of human kinesin-1 bound to αβ-tubulin. The structure defines the mechanism of microtubule-stimulated ATP hydrolysis, which releases the kinesin motor domain from microtubules. It also reveals the structural linkages that connect the ATP nucleotide to the kinesin neck linker, a 15-amino acid segment C terminal to the catalytic core of the motor domain, to result in the power stroke. ATP binding to the microtubule-bound kinesin favors neck-linker docking. This biases the attachment of kinesin's second head in the direction of the movement, thus initiating each of the steps taken.
Organizational Affiliation: 
Laboratoire d'Enzymologie et Biochimie Structurales, Centre de Recherche de Gif, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Gif sur Yvette, France.