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Zui Pan
Assistant
Professor
UMDNJ
Dept. of Physiology/Biophysics
683 Hoes Lane
RWJMS Research Building. Room 157
Piscataway. NJ 08854
(732) 235-4509
FAX - 4483
panzu@umdnj.edu |
Calcium Signaling in Muscle Physiology and Tumorigenesis
Ion calcium, as a second messenger, plays an essential role in many cell processes including muscle contraction, cell proliferation and apoptosis. My laboratory’s research interests focus on Ca2+ signaling in muscle physiology and tumorigenesis. Particularly, we study Store-Operated Ca2+ Entry (SOCE), a pathway to allow extracellular Ca2+ to pass the plasma membrane for replenishment of the depleted intracellular Ca2+ stores.
With several muscle specific proteins deficient mouse strains, we previously demonstrated that SOCE exists in skeletal muscle with important physiological functions. The activation of SOCE requires the adjacency of plasma membrane and sarcoplasmic reticulum (SR) membrane, the interaction between the Ca2+ sensor docking at ER/SR and the Ca2+ channel locating at plasma membrane, as well as the presence of ryanodine receptor. Using microarray and RNA interfering techniques, we have identified co-factors for regulation of SOCE in muscles. Our current effort is to characterize the role of these genes in SOCE and to investigate their functions in muscle fatigue, muscle development and aging.
Alteration in SOCE not only causes muscle weakness but may also contribute to carcinogenesis, such as in prostate cancer and esophageal tumor cells. We have found that several key proteins in SOCE pathway are either down-regulated or up-regulated in those cancer cells. Our research here is to understand the molecular mechanisms underlying the perturbed Ca2+ signaling and how the changes in SOCE affects cancer cell growth, migration and apoptosis.
The long-term goal of our research is to identify a therapeutic target to overcome muscle weakness in aged population or to reduce tumorigenesis in cancer patients. The experimental methods to accomplish our aims include molecular biology techniques and heterogeneous expression of eukaryotic genes, spectrofluorometer measurement of intracellular Ca2+ and confocal microscopy live cell imaging of Ca2+ and fluorescent protein-tagged molecules.
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