Journal
CELL REPORTS
Volume 2, Issue 2, Pages 242-248Publisher
CELL PRESS
DOI: 10.1016/j.celrep.2012.06.016
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Funding
- EMBO [ALTF 1096-2009]
- Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development [F32HD062178]
- Austrian National Science Foundation [FWF P 21108-B17]
- United States-Israel Binational Agricultural Research and Development [IS-4313-10]
- Israeli Science Foundation [107/08]
- Austrian Science Fund (FWF) [P 22717, P 22618, P 21108] Funding Source: researchfish
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Ion selectivity of metazoan voltage-gated Na+ channels is critical for neuronal signaling and has long been attributed to a ring of four conserved amino acids that constitute the ion selectivity filter (SF) at the channel pore. Yet, in addition to channels with a preference for Ca2+ ions, the expression and characterization of Na+ channel homologs from the sea anemone Nematostella vectensis, a member of the early-branching metazoan phylumCnidaria, revealed a sodium-selective channel bearing a noncanonical SF. Mutagenesis and physiological assays suggest that pore elements additional to the SF determine the preference for Na+ in this channel. Phylogenetic analysis assigns the Nematostella Na+-selective channel to a channel group unique to Cnidaria, which diverged >540 million years ago from Ca2+-conducting Na+ channel homologs. The identification of Cnidarian Na+-selective ion channels distinct from the channels of bilaterian animals indicates that selectivity for Na+ in neuronal signaling emerged independently in these two animal lineages.
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