Assembly and function of cell surface structures of archaea

Members of the third domain of life, the Archaea, exhibit a number of different cell surface structures which are similar in assembly and function to bacterial type IV pili. Type IV pili play an important role in surface motility and adhesion, DNA transfer and invasion of eukaryotic host cells. Archaeal type IV pili like filaments are build from a minimal set of subunits facilitating the progress of understanding the mechanism of how these and other bacterial type IV pili are assembled.