These tools will no longer be maintained as of December 31, 2024. Archived website can be found here. PubMed4Hh GitHub repository can be found here. Contact NLM Customer Service if you have questions.


PUBMED FOR HANDHELDS

Search MEDLINE/PubMed


  • Title: Isolation of calcium-dependent platelet proteins that interact with actin.
    Author: Wang LL, Bryan J.
    Journal: Cell; 1981 Sep; 25(3):637-49. PubMed ID: 6793237.
    Abstract:
    Low Ca2+ extracts of platelets rapidly form an actin gel when warmed to 25 degrees C. The addition of Ca2+ has three effects. At Ca/EGTA = 0.4, the gel begins to contract. Increasing the Ca2+ concentration increases the rate of contraction and reduces the amount of actomyosin gel. Between Ca/EGTA = 0.4 and 0.5, a protease is activated that selectively degrades polypeptides with molecular weight greater than the myosin heavy chain. At Ca/EGTA = 1, about 70% of the total actin is nonsedimentable. Addition of excess EGTA produces the rapid formation of an actomyosin gel, which is not readily solubilized by re-addition of calcium. Using DNAase l-Sepharose chromatography, we have isolated a protein fraction whose binding to actin is Ca2+ -dependent. This fraction contains a major polypeptide with a molecular weight of 90,000. This fraction increases the rate of development of high sheer viscosity, but lowers the final value if Ca2+ is present. This decrease in viscosity is due to the generation of shorter filaments. In the presence of Ca2+, this protein(s) selectively blocks the addition of actin monomers to the barbed end of glutaraldehyde-fixed S1-decorated actin fragments and will nucleate assembly of filaments. We speculate that this protein(s) may serve as a Ca2+ -dependent nucleation site in situ.
    [Abstract] [Full Text] [Related] [New Search]