{"doi":"10.1101/2023.02.15.528685","title":"Scanning electron microscopy of human islet cilia","abstract":"Human islet primary cilia are vital glucose-regulating organelles whose structure remains uncharacterized. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) is a useful technique for studying the surface morphology of membrane projections like primary cilia, but conventional sample preparation does not reveal the sub-membrane axonemal structure which holds key implications for cilia function. To overcome this challenge, we combined SEM with membrane-extraction techniques to examine cilia in native human islets. Our data show well-preserved cilia subdomains which demonstrate both expected and unexpected ultrastructural motifs. Morphometric features were quantified when possible, including axonemal length and diameter, microtubule conformations and chirality. We further describe a novel ciliary ring, a structure that may be a specialization in human islets. Key findings are correlated with fluorescence microscopy and interpreted in the context of cilia function as a cellular sensor and communications locus in pancreatic islets.","journal":"bioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory)","year":2023,"id":392984,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":4,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9522,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2023-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":552525,"name":"Sanja Sviben","orcid":"0000-0001-5918-4834","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":722638,"name":"Isabella Melena","orcid":null,"position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":281276,"name":"David W. Piston","orcid":"0000-0002-1200-3116","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":281270,"name":"Jing W. Hughes","orcid":"0000-0003-4397-8175","position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":277845,"name":"Alexander J. Polino","orcid":"0000-0003-2601-3638","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":77,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-19T01:19:01.355412Z","pmid":"36824775","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}