Authors: Aniruddha Mitra, Evangelos Gioukakis, Wouter Mul, Erwin J. G. Peterman; Science Advances (2025) 

In this work, we directly visualize how the building blocks of intraflagellar transport (IFT) reach the base of sensory cilia and assemble into functional transport trains. Using quantitative single-molecule imaging in living C. elegans, we show that IFT-B and IFT-A subcomplexes are actively delivered to the ciliary base, while BBSome components arrive mainly by diffusion. At the base, these components detach from their carriers and are incorporated step-by-step into assembling IFT trains. This reveals a regulated, multi-stage assembly pathway that governs how proteins are sorted and gain entry into cilia, an essential process for sensory signaling and ciliary function. Read More 

Authors: Aniruddha Mitra, Elizaveta Loseva, Erwin J. G. Peterman; Nature Communications (2024) 

How do motors and cargo actually board IFT trains before entering the cilium? Here, we show that this process is sequential and highly coordinated. By tracking individual molecules at the ciliary base, we reveal that kinesin motors, dynein, and cargo proteins associate with IFT trains in a defined order before entry. We further demonstrate how this choreography is altered in motor and transition-zone mutants. These results uncover the dynamic “boarding process” at the ciliary gate and explain how efficient and selective transport into the sensory compartment is achieved. Read More. 

Authors: Aniruddha Mitra, Elizaveta Loseva, Guus H. Haasnoot, Erwin J.G. Peterman; Optics Communications (2023)  

We introduce Small-Window Illumination Microscopy (SWIM), a simple yet powerful approach that transforms single-molecule imaging inside C. elegans neurons. By restricting excitation to a narrow region within a neuron, SWIM drastically reduces background autofluorescence, enabling high quality single-molecule imaging over long-durations inside living worms. We demonstrate this by following vesicle transport in C. elegans sensory neurons with unprecedented detail. SWIM opens the door to quantitative single-molecule studies of intracellular transport and cytoskeletal dynamics in intact organisms. Read More 

Authors: Aniruddha Mitra, Laura Meißner, Rojapriyadharshini Gandhimathi, Roman Renger, Felix Ruhnow and Stefan Diez; Nature Communications (2023)  

Microtubule-crosslinking kinesins do more than just slide filaments, they can twist them. In this study, we show that kinesin-14 motors drive antiparallel microtubules into a right-handed helical motion around each other. Using a three-dimensional in vitro assay, we reveal that microtubules not only translate but also rotate as they slide. This torque-generating behavior suggests a new mechanical role for motors in shaping cytoskeletal architectures, such as the mitotic spindle, as well as helping individual microtubules navigate inside crowded microtubule bundles. Read More 

Authors: Aniruddha Mitra, Felix Ruhnow, Salvatore Girardo, and Stefan Diez; PNAS (2018)
By tracking single kinesin-8 motors on freely suspended microtubules, we discovered that these motors do not walk straight—they sidestep laterally with a left-biased helical trajectory. We show that this bias is controlled by the ATP waiting time and emerges from a specific transition in the kinesin stepping cycle. This work reveals how molecular motors explore the three-dimensional surface of microtubules and provides a general mechanism for how transport proteins can navigate obstacles in the crowded interior of cells. Read More