Biochemical studies of the structure and function of theN-methyl-D-aspartate subtype of glutamate receptors |
| |
Authors: | Anthone W Dunah Robert P Yasuda Jianhong Luo Yuehua Wang Kate L Prybylowski Barry B Wolfe |
| |
Institution: | (1) Department of Pharmacology, Georgetown University School of Medicine, Washington, DC;(2) Present address: Department of Neurology, Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, 02114 Boston, MA;(3) Present address: Medical Molecular Biology Laboratory, Zhejiang Medical University, 310031 Hangzhou, China |
| |
Abstract: | TheN-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) subtype of glutamate receptors plays a key role in synaptic transmission, synaptic plasticity, synaptogenesis,
and excitotocity in the mammalian central nervous system. The NMDA receptor channel is formed from two gene products from
two glutamate receptor subunit families, termed NR1 and NR2. Although the subunit composition of native NMDA receptors is
incompletely understood, electrophysiological studies using recombinant receptors suggest that functional NMDA receptors consist
of heteromers containing combinations of NR1, which is essential for channel activity, and NR2, which modulates the properties
of the channels. The lack of agonists or antagonists selective for a given subunit of NMDA receptors has made it difficult
to understand the subunit expression, subunit composition, and posttranslational modification mechanisms of native NMDA receptors.
Therefore, most studies on NMDA receptors that examine regional expression and ontogeny have been focused at the level of
the mRNAs encoding the different subunits using northern blotting, ribonuclease protection, andin situ hybridization techniques. However, the data from these studies do not provide clear information about the resultant subunit
protein. To directly examine the protein product of the NMDA receptor subunit genes, the development of subunit-specific antibodies
using peptides and fusion proteins has provided a good approach for localizing, quantifying, and characterizing the receptor
subunits in tissues and transfected cell lines, and to study the subunit composition and the functional effects of posttranslational
processing of the NMDA subunits, particularly the phosphorylation profiles of NMDA glutamate receptors. |
| |
Keywords: | Antibodies NMDA western blot immunoprecipitation tyrosine phosphorylation regional expression developmental expression subunit composition |
本文献已被 SpringerLink 等数据库收录! |
|