Abstract
While it is getting a consensus of plant scientists that the endocytic pathway plays very important roles in the various plant function of higher order, the knowledge on the molecular mechanism of endocytosis in plant cells is still very limited. We are studying the molecular mechanism of the endocytosis especially focusing on the SNARE and Rab proteins. We previously screened all SNARE proteins for endosomal SNAREs, and found that only one SNARE protein, AtVamp727, is localized almost exclusively on the Rab5-positive endosomes (Ueda et al.,2004; Uemura et al., 2004), which strongly suggests that AtVamp727 is committed in the membrane fusion at endosomes. To reveal a function of this molecule more precisely, we examined a genetic interaction between AtVAMP727 and other endocytic SNAREs or RABs. In this meeting, we are reporting the results which suggest an important function of AtVamp727 in the vacuolar biogenesis.
