Literature by the same author
plus at Google Scholar

Bibliografische Daten exportieren
 

Connexins evolved after early chordates lost innexin diversity

Title data

Welzel, Georg ; Schuster, Stefan:
Connexins evolved after early chordates lost innexin diversity.
In: eLife. Vol. 11 (January 2022) . - No. e74422.
ISSN 2050-084X
DOI: https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.74422

Official URL: Volltext

Project information

Project title:
Project's official title
Project's id
Open Access Publizieren
No information

Project financing: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft

Abstract in another language

Gap junction channels are formed by two unrelated protein families. Non-chordates use the primordial innexins, while chordates use connexins that superseded the gap junction function of innexins. Chordates retained innexin-homologs, but N-glycosylation prevents them from forming gap junctions. It is puzzling why chordates seem to exclusively use the new gap junction protein and why no chordates should exist that use non-glycosylated innexins to form gap junctions. Here, we identified glycosylation sites of 2388 innexins from 174 non-chordate and 276 chordate species. Among all chordates, we found not a single innexin without glycosylation sites. Surprisingly, the glycosylation motif is also widespread among non-chordate innexins indicating that glycosylated innexins are not a novelty of chordates. In addition, we discovered a loss of innexin diversity during early chordate evolution. Most importantly, lancelets, which lack connexins, exclusively possess only one highly conserved innexin with one glycosylation site. A bottleneck effect might thus explain why connexins have become the only protein used to form chordate gap junctions.

Further data

Item Type: Article in a journal
Refereed: Yes
Keywords: gap junction evolution; innexin; pannexin; connexin; N-glycosylation
Institutions of the University: Faculties > Faculty of Biology, Chemistry and Earth Sciences > Department of Biology > Chair Animal Physiology > Chair Animal Physiology - Univ.-Prof. Dr. Stefan Schuster
Faculties
Faculties > Faculty of Biology, Chemistry and Earth Sciences
Faculties > Faculty of Biology, Chemistry and Earth Sciences > Department of Biology
Faculties > Faculty of Biology, Chemistry and Earth Sciences > Department of Biology > Chair Animal Physiology
Result of work at the UBT: Yes
DDC Subjects: 500 Science > 570 Life sciences, biology
Date Deposited: 18 Mar 2023 22:00
Last Modified: 20 Mar 2023 06:14
URI: https://eref.uni-bayreuth.de/id/eprint/74299