Alloaffinity filtration: a general approach to the purification of dynein and dynein-like molecules

Alloaffinity filtration simply and specifically separates certain axonemal dyneins and dynein arm components from crude mixtures on the basis of their ability to bind and decorate Tetrahymena axonemal microtubules on a filter in the absence of ATP and to detach and pass into the eluate when 0.5 mM ATP is added. The procedure, which may be performed repetitively, is successful in purifying a Tetrahymena dynein that has characteristics of 30 S dynein prepared by conventional methods, while other dyneins originally present in the mixture, e.g., 14 S Tetrahymena dynein, are not found in the ATP eluate. A relatively homogeneous population of dynein oligomers is obtained. Alloaffinity-purified 30 S Tetrahymena dynein consists of heavy-, intermediate-, and light-chain polypeptides that cosediment in a sucrose gradient in fixed molar ratios and that have structural features of in situ Tetrahymena arms. Dyneins from other species will bind to Tetrahymena microtubules and can be purified by this method. Alloaffinity-purified Chlamydomonas dynein is a set of polypeptides including the four heavy chains that characterize the outer arm.