Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gxg78 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-27T11:20:42.709Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Three-Dimensional Structure of the Gap Junction Connexon and Intercellular Channel

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 July 2020

Guy Perkins ,
Dan Goodenough  and
Gina Sosinsky
Guy Perkins
Affiliation:
Dept. of Biology, San Diego State University, San Diego, CA, 92182-4614 & NCMIR, University of California, San Diego, 9500 Gilman Drive, La Jolla, CA, 92093-0608
Dan Goodenough
Affiliation:
Dept. of Cell Biology, Harvard Medical School, 220 Longwood Aveue, Boston, MA, 02115
Gina Sosinsky
Affiliation:
Dept. of Neurosciences and Biology, University of California, San Diego, 9500 Gilman Drive, La Jolla, CA, 92093-0322
Get access

Extract

Gap junctions are specialized cell-cell contact areas by which cells communication with each other. Within these contact areas are tens to thousands of membrane channels. A gap junction membrane channel (also referred to as an intercellular channel) is unique among membrane channels in that it is composed of two oligomers with each of two adjacent tissue cells contributing one oligomer (called a connexon or hemichannel). The pore of the intercellular channel controls the passage of small molecules and ions from one cell to another.

We are interested in how the structure and surface topology of the gap junction connexon at its extracellular surface influences the docking and formation of an intercellular communicating channel. It has been demonstrated that connexons made from some connexins will dock and form functional channels with some but not all connexons made from other isoforms. This selectivity is surprising considering that the primary sequences of the docking domains are highly conserved.

Type
Innovative Approaches to 3-D Structure/Function Determination for Cells and Organelles
Information
Microscopy and Microanalysis , Volume 3 , Issue S2: Proceedings: Microscopy & Microanalysis '97, Microscopy Society of America 55th Annual Meeting, Microbeam Analysis Society 31st Annual Meeting, Histochemical Society 48th Annual Meeting, Cleveland, Ohio, August 10-14, 1997 , August 1997 , pp. 227 - 228
Copyright
Copyright © Microscopy Society of America 1997

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1.Hoh, et al. Biophys. J., (1993) 65, 149–16310.1016/S0006-3495(93)81074-9CrossRefGoogle Scholar
2.Perkins, et al., Biophys. J., (1997) 72, 533–54410.1016/S0006-3495(97)78693-4CrossRefGoogle Scholar