title: An archimedian spiral: the basal disk of the Wolinella flagellar motor.
abstract: The motor that powers the rotation of the bacterial flagellum reaches through both membranes into the cytoplasm of Gram-negative bacteria. The flagellum is connected by a flexible link (hook) to the motor axis, which passes through the center of a structure called the basal disk. The basal disk functions with the L-P ring complex as a bushing, enabling the rotation of the motor in the cell wall. The protein subunits of the basal disk of Wolinella succinogenes form an Archimedian spiral. The polymerization of subunits from a nucleation point at the motor in the form of a spiral allows constant growth of the basal disk. The disk is thought to provide a reinforcement at the flagellar insertion at the cell pole and to disperse forces that are generated by the momentum of the flagellar rotation.
authors.affiliation: Department for Structural Biology, Max Planck Institute for Biochemistry, Martinsried, Germany.
authors.forename: H
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Engelhardt
authors.forename: S C
authors.initials: SC
authors.lastname: Schuster
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Baeuerlein
mesh_terms: D001426:Bacterial Proteins / Q000737:chemistry; D005407:Flagella / Q000737:chemistry / Q000502:physiology / Q000648:ultrastructure*; D005583:Fourier Analysis; D016968:Wolinella / Q000502:physiology / Q000648:ultrastructure*
chemical_list: D001426:Bacterial Proteins