Unravelling the molecular secrets of yeast sexuality

In a paper published in Communications Biology, a LIBST group and the Lipke team (USA) - use single-cell fluidic force microscopy to investigate the molecular binding mechanisms of sexual agglutinins in budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae.They report that mechanical tension enhances the strength of agglutinin interactions, supporting a new model in which physical stress induces conformational changes in the binding sites of agglutinins.