bioRxiv preprint doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.01.22.915066; this version posted January 22, 2020. The copyright holder for this preprint (which was not certified by peer review) is the author/funder. All rights reserved. No reuse allowed without permission. Mitochondria-adaptor TRAK1 promotes kinesin-1 driven transport in crowded environments Verena Henrichs,1,2 Lenka Grycova,1 Cyril Barinka,1 Zuzana Nahacka,1 Jiri Neuzil,1,3 Stefan Diez,4 Jakub Rohlena,1 Marcus Braun,1,* Zdenek Lansky,1,* 1 Institute of Biotechnology of the Czech Academy of Sciences, BIOCEV, Vestec, Prague West, 25250, Czech Republic; 2 Faculty of Science, Charles University in Prague, Prague, 12800, Czech Republic; 3 School of Medical Science, Griffith University, Southport, Qld, 4222 Australia 4 B CUBE, Center of Molecular Bioengineering, Technische Universität Dresden, Dresden, Sachsen, 01307, Germany * Correspondence:
[email protected] (M.B.),
[email protected] (Z.L.) Summary Intracellular trafficking of organelles, driven by kinesin-1 stepping along microtubules, underpins essential processes including neuronal activity. In absence of other proteins on the microtubule surface, kinesin-1 performs micron-long runs. Under protein crowding conditions, however, kinesin-1 motility is drastically impeded. It is thus unclear how kinesin-1 acts as an efficient transporter in crowded intracellular environments. Here, we demonstrate that TRAK1 (Milton), an adaptor protein essential for mitochondrial trafficking, activates kinesin-1 and increases its robustness of stepping in protein crowding conditions. Interaction with TRAK1 i) facilitated kinesin-1 navigation around obstacles, ii) increased the probability of kinesin-1 passing through cohesive envelopes of tau and iii) increased the run length of kinesin-1 in cell lysate.