Vesicle docking brings a transport vesicle into close, stable association with its target membrane before membrane fusion. Recognition factors and SNARE proteins help organize the contact. Docking and fusion are experimentally distinct: a carrier can remain attached without exchanging its internal contents with the target compartment. Reconstituted liposomes bearing appropriate SNARE proteins allowed such docked intermediates to be distinguished from subsequent fusion. [ref]
SNAREpins: minimal machinery for membrane fusion by T. Weber and others. Weber and others, 1998, abstract: docked unfused intermediates and temperature-dependent fusion
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