cerevisiae (Pagliuca et al., 2009). However, Spc7/Spc105 forms complex with Sos7, which has been identified recently as a KT protein in fission yeast S. pombe (Jakopec et al., 2012). Spc7 and Sos7 are interdependent for their KT localization (Jakopec et al., 2012). Both the proteins are dependent on Mis12 for their loading at the KT (Kerres et al., 2007; Jakopec et al., 2012). The Dam1 complex is essential for cell viability and localized at the KT throughout cell cycle in both budding yeasts, S. cerevisiae (Hofmann et al., 1998; Cheeseman et al., 2001a, b; Enquist-Newman et al., 2001) and C. albicans (Burrack et al., 2011;

Thakur & Sanyal, 2011). CENP-A influences the KT recruitment of this complex in both the budding yeasts (Collins et al., 2005; Burrack et al., 2011). In contrast to budding yeasts, the Dam1 complex Z-VAD-FMK mouse is nonessential for cell viability in fission selleck kinase inhibitor yeast S. pombe. Moreover, except Dad1, other subunits of this complex localize at the KT only during mitosis in S. pombe (Liu et al., 2005; Sanchez-Perez et al., 2005). The recruitment of

the Dam1 complex is affected by Ndc10, Mis12 and Ndc80 in S. cerevisiae (He et al., 2001; Li et al., 2002; Scharfenberger et al., 2003; Collins et al., 2005; Pagliuca et al., 2009), whereas localization of the Dam1 complex is controlled by the Mis6 complex proteins in S. pombe (Liu et al., 2005; Sanchez-Perez et al., 2005). In this review, we compared the process and sequence of events during KT assembly in three different PAK5 ascomycetous yeasts, each carrying a specific type of CEN. While similarities and differences in KT assembly in these organisms are evident, some key questions need to be experimentally addressed. Ndc10 is the key determinant in KT assembly in S. cerevisiae. Is there a functional homolog of Ndc10 in organisms (such as C. albicans and S. pombe) possessing sequence-independent regional CENs? The requirement of Scm3 for loading of CENP-A is found to be similar in S. cerevisiae and S. pombe but not yet studied in C. albicans. The localization dependence between Ndc80

and CENP-A has been examined in S. cerevisiae and C. albicans but not in S. pombe. The roles of an inner KT protein Mis6/Ctf3 and a middle KT protein Spc105/Spc7 in KT assembly have been studied in S. cerevisiae and S. pombe. The identification and characterization of the functional homologs of these proteins in C. albicans will improve our knowledge of KT assembly in this yeast. The requirement of the Dam1 complex for assembly of a KT also differs between two budding yeasts, S. cerevisiae and C. albicans. The Dam1 complex requires components of inner and middle KT for its KT localization in S. cerevisiae but not vice versa. In contrast, depletion of the Dam1 complex results in the disruption of KT architecture and destabilization of CENP-A in C. albicans (Thakur & Sanyal, 2012).