Final Report Summary - CYTOCHEM (A Chemical Approach to Understanding Cell Division)
Cell division is a complex process that requires the action of many different cellular components. It is tightly regulated to make sure division occurs at the right time and in the right place. Many aspects of cell division are still poorly understood. The overall goal of this project was to increase our knowledge of cell division using a combination of chemical biology and cell biology approaches, with a focus on the Rho regulatory pathway. In the course of the project, we discovered several new proteins involved in the process and determined how they contribute to cell division. We also discovered and characterized new chemical tools to study Rho signalling. More broadly, we explored how the cell division machinery interfaces with other processes that involve the cytoskeleton such as cell movement and cell-cell junctions. Cells use overlapping proteins to achieve these different outcomes and it is often unclear how this is regulated.