Mitochondrial binding of a protein affected in mutants resistant to the microtubule inhibitor podophyllotoxin

Specific antibodies to a protein P1 Mr approximately equal to 63,000) from Chinese hamster ovary cells, which is affected in mutants resistant to the microtubule inhibitor, podophyllotoxin, and behaves like a microtubule-related protein by certain criteria 14], have been raised. The antibody reacts specifically with the P1 protein in one- and two-dimensional immunoblots, and a cross-reacting protein of similar molecular mass and electrophoretic mobility is also found in cells from various vertebrate and invertebrate species. The observed similarity in the peptide maps of the cross-reacting protein from human, mouse, Chinese hamster and chicken cells indicates that the structure of this protein should be highly conserved. However, no P1-antibody cross-reacting protein was observed in plants (corn, mung), fungus (Neurospora crassa), yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae) and bacteria (Escherichia coli and Salmonella typhimurium). Immunofluorescence studies with the P1-antibody show that, in interphase cells of various cross-reacting species, it bound specifically to mitochondria which were associated and distributed on and along the length of microtubules. Similar association and codistribution of mitochondria and microtubules were not observed in mitotic cells. Some implications of the mitochondrial localization of the protein P1 and the observed association between microtubules and mitochondria are discussed.