Structure, Activation, and Biology of Calpain
- 1Tokyo Metropolitan Institute of Gerontology, Tokyo, Japan
- 2Laboratory of Biological Function, Department of Applied Biological Chemistry, Graduate School of Agricultural and Life Sciences, the University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan
- Address correspondence and reprint requests to Dr. Koichi Suzuki, Pioneering Research Laboratories, 1111 Tebiro, Kamakura City, Kanagawa 248-8555, Japan. E-mail: koichi_suzuki{at}nts.toray.co.jp
Abstract
Variation in the calpain 10 gene has recently been shown to be associated with type 2 diabetes by positional cloning. Since then, studies on calpain 10 have been started in correlation with diabetes and insulin-mediated signaling. In this review, the activation mechanism of calpain by calcium ions, which is essential to understand its physiological functions, is discussed on the basis of recent X-ray structural analyses. Further, special features of the structure of calpain 10 that differ from those of typical μ- or m-calpain used in most studies are summarized together with discussion of the physiological function of calpain with respect to type 2 diabetes.
Footnotes
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This article is based on a presentation at a symposium. The symposium and the publication of this article were made possible by an unrestricted educational grant from Les Laboratoires Servier.
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- Accepted June 5, 2003.
- Received March 14, 2003.
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