Spindle Fibres & Kinetochores — NEET Biology

Spindle fibres attach to kinetochores (specialized protein structures on centromeres) during metaphase to pull sister chromatids apart. Students often confuse kinetochores with centromeres—remember that kinetochores are protein complexes assembled ON the centromere where spindle fibres actually attach. The key trap: assuming spindle fibres connect directly to the chromosome DNA itself rather than specifically to kinetochore proteins. To ace this, memorize: kinetochores are the attachment sites, not the centromere itself. This concept appears in NEET because understanding chromosome segregation mechanisms is fundamental to cell division.