PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Tamás Matusek
AU  - Rita Gombos
AU  - Anita Szécsényi
AU  - Natalia Sánchez-Soriano
AU  - Ágnes Czibula
AU  - Csilla Pataki
AU  - Anita Gedai
AU  - Andreas Prokop
AU  - István Raskó
AU  - József Mihály
TI  - Formin Proteins of the DAAM Subfamily Play a Role during Axon Growth
AID  - 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.2727-08.2008
DP  - 2008 Dec 03
TA  - The Journal of Neuroscience
PG  - 13310--13319
VI  - 28
IP  - 49
4099  - http://www.jneurosci.org/content/28/49/13310.short
4100  - http://www.jneurosci.org/content/28/49/13310.full
SO  - J. Neurosci.2008 Dec 03; 28
AB  - The regulation of growth cone actin dynamics is a critical aspect of axonal growth control. Among the proteins that are directly involved in the regulation of actin dynamics, actin nucleation factors play a pivotal role by promoting the formation of novel actin filaments. However, the essential nucleation factors in developing neurons have so far not been clearly identified. Here, we show expression data, and use true loss-of-function analysis and targeted expression of activated constructs to demonstrate that the Drosophila formin DAAM plays a critical role in axonal morphogenesis. In agreement with this finding, we show that dDAAM is required for filopodia formation at axonal growth cones. Our genetic interaction, immunoprecipitation and protein localization studies argue that dDAAM acts in concert with Rac GTPases, Profilin and Enabled during axonal growth regulation. We also show that mouse Daam1 rescues the CNS defects observed in dDAAM mutant flies to a high degree, and vice versa, that Drosophila DAAM induces the formation of neurite-like protrusions when expressed in mouse P19 cells, strongly suggesting that the function of DAAM in developing neurons has been conserved during evolution.