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Focal Adhesion Kinase Modulates Cdc42 Activity Downstream Of Positive And Negative Axon Guidance Cues, Jonathan P. Myers, Estuardo Robles, Allison Ducharme-Smith, Timothy M. Gomez

Neuroscience: Faculty Publications

There is biochemical, imaging and functional evidence that Rho GTPase signaling is a crucial regulator of actin-based structures such as lamellipodia and filopodia. However, although Rho GTPases are believed to serve similar functions in growth cones, the spatiotemporal dynamics of Rho GTPase signaling has not been examined in living growth cones in response to known axon guidance cues. Here we provide the first measurements of Cdc42 activity in living growth cones acutely stimulated with both growth-promoting and growthinhibiting axon-guidance cues. Interestingly, we find that both permissive and repulsive factors can work by modulating Cdc42 activity, but in opposite directions. We …