Researchers investigating the mechanism of vesicular transport assembled a cell-free system that included microtubule tracks, vesicles, and ATP. However, they observed no movement of transport of vesicles in this system. What were they missing?
In order for there to be cell motility, a motor protein is required to interact with the cytoskeleton. Once one end of a motor protein attaches to the microtubule of the cytoskeleton and the other end is attached to the vesicle, the motor protein can "walk along" the microtubule tracks.
