- Kinetoplast
A Kinetoplast is a disk-shaped mass of circular
DNA s inside a largemitochondrion that contains many copies of themitochondrial genome . [cite journal |author=Shapiro TA, Englund PT |title=The structure and replication of kinetoplast DNA |journal=Annu. Rev. Microbiol. |volume=49 |pages=117–43 |year=1995 |pmid=8561456 |doi=10.1146/annurev.mi.49.100195.001001] [cite journal |author=Shlomai J |title=The structure and replication of kinetoplast DNA |journal=Curr. Mol. Med. |volume=4 |issue=6 |pages=623–47 |year=2004 |pmid=15357213 |doi=10.2174/1566524043360096] Kinetoplasts are only found inprotozoa of the classkinetoplastea . Kinetoplasts are usually adjacent to the organisms' flagellarbasal body leading to the thought that they are tightly bound to thecytoskeleton .Trypanosomes, a group of flagellated protozoans have a kinetoplast contained inside one large mitochondrion. "
Trypanosoma brucei ", the parasite which causesAfrican trypanosomiasis (African sleeping sickness), is an example of a Trypanosome with a kinetoplast. Its kinetoplast is easily visible in samples stained withDAPI , afluorescent DNA stain.References
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