title: The archaellum: how Archaea swim.
abstract: Recent studies on archaeal motility have shown that the archaeal motility structure is unique in several aspects. Although it fulfills the same swimming function as the bacterial flagellum, it is evolutionarily and structurally related to the type IV pilus. This was the basis for the recent proposal to term the archaeal motility structure the "archaellum." This review illustrates the key findings that led to the realization that the archaellum was a novel motility structure and presents the current knowledge about the structural composition, mechanism of assembly and regulation, and the posttranslational modifications of archaella.
authors.affiliation: Molecular Biology of Archaea, Institute of Biology II-Microbiology, University of Freiburg , Freiburg, Germany ; Molecular Biology of Archaea, Max Planck Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology , Marburg, Germany.
authors.forename: Sonja-Verena
authors.initials: SV
authors.lastname: Albers
authors.affiliation: Department of Biomedical and Molecular Sciences, Queen's University , Kingston, ON, Canada.
authors.forename: Ken F
authors.initials: KF
authors.lastname: Jarrell
keywords: archaeal flagellum; archaellum; motility; motor complex; type IV pili