Team Dynein

All physiological processes require force. For example, you must generate force to move around, cells must generate force to divide etc. The unit generator of this force is a molecule called a motor protein. The motor uses energy from ATP to generate about 10-12 Newtons of force. This is certainly not enough for you to move around -- therefore, multiple motors must work collectively in a team to do things inside the cells of your body. How motors in team generate force collectively is therefore important, but poorly understood. 

We have now measured this collective force inside living cells with the precision of a single motor's force. Remarkably and counter-intuitively, nature uses a weak and inefficient motor to generate large persistent force during many different cellular processes. This is the dynein motor. Our data suggests that dynein uses a gear mechanism to work better in a team. We provide mechanistic insight into why and how such geared teams of motors work better.

Lastly, some inspiration for this talk’s title:- In our experiments, a team has about 11 dynein motors !!