Mitosis in Oedogonium: spindle microfilaments and the origin of the kinetochore fiber.

New ultrastructural observations of mitosis in the closed spindle of Oedogonium cardiacum have been made using cells fixed with glutaraldehyde and tannic acid. Fine filaments 5 to 8 nm in diameter are attached to kinetochores from prophase through anaphase. Some are free in the early division nucleus while others emanate from forming kinetochores at prophase when few if any microtubules (MTs) are inside the nucleus. During prometaphase, MTs invade the nucleus from the poles and appear to interact with the microfilaments. Early in prometaphase, numerous MTs are laterally associated with kinetochores, and the kinetochore fiber is often formed first at one kinetochore of a pair. During metaphase and anaphase, the microfilaments are interspersed among the MTs of these kinetochore fibers. There also is an ill-defined matrix concentrated in the kinetochore fiber, and MTs are often coated irregularly with osmiophilic material. Live mitotic cells of Oedogonium were studied using time lapse cinematography, and we correlate these observations with the above results. We conclude that these microfilaments may constitute one structural component of the traction apparatus that moves chromosomes during metakinesis and anaphase, and that at least some (and possibly many) of the MTs of the kinetochore fiber are derived from those entering the nucleus at prometaphase.