The protein complex that the cells of animals, plants, and fungi use to control cell division was created long ago from at least 40 different proteins. This could explain the overwhelming success of all cells with a cell nucleus, according to researchers at Utrecht University and the Hubrecht Institute. Their results were published in the scientific journal PNAS on 24 May.
“You might think that a fungus more closely resembles bacteria than it does us”, says Geert Kops, cell biologist at the Hubrecht Institute. “But that’s not the case. In contrast to the prokaryotic bacterial cells, the eukaryotic cells of fungi, plants, and animals all have a nucleus that stores the DNA.”