Objective
Disturbances in ion channel function lead to serious diseases of the nervous system, skeletal and cardiac muscle, and intestine which makes ion channels important drug targets for the pharmaceutical industry. Calcium currents through L-type voltage-gated C a2+ channels (L-VGCCs) play a key role in the cellular signalling in brain, heart, smooth muscles, sensory (e.g. inner ear, retina), and endocrine cells (e.g. pancreatic islets). In distinct cells of these organs, the pore forming 1-subunits Cav1.2 and/or Cav1.3 conduct Ca2+ currents that are required for their function. To address the important question about the differential contribution and functional communication of these L-VGCC isoforms and their potential role in other tissues an already existing net work of collaborating scientists will be complemented by excellent researchers providing the required advanced research methods and front-end ion channel expertise. As Cav1.2 and Cav1.3 show an overlapping expression pattern in a variety of tissues and sub unit-specific antagonists or agonists are not available so far, genetic tools are urgently needed to dissect the specific roles of both Cav1.2 and Cav1.3 in normal and pathological function. This consortium will complement its existing mouse models by new ones and will apply state of the art molecular biological, electrophysiological, Ca2+ imaging techniques and behavioural analyses to reveal the physiological role and pharmaco-therapeutic potential of these channels with a special focus on various diseases (e.g Alzheimer, epilepsy, arrhythmias, diabetes, tinnitus, deafness). The long standing and complementary expertise of the network partners will not only advance our understanding of the role of individual L-VGCC subtypes in health and disease but also provides an excellent opportunity for an integrative and interdisciplinary but appropriately focussed training in the field of signal transduction in general and ion channels in particular.
Fields of science
- medical and health sciencesbasic medicineneurologyepilepsy
- medical and health sciencesclinical medicinecardiologycardiovascular diseasescardiac arrhythmia
- medical and health sciencesbasic medicineneurologydementiaalzheimer
- medical and health sciencesclinical medicineendocrinologydiabetes
- medical and health sciencesmedical biotechnologycells technologiesstem cells
Keywords
Call for proposal
FP6-2005-MOBILITY-1
See other projects for this call
Funding Scheme
RTN - Marie Curie actions-Research Training NetworksCoordinator
TUEBINGEN
Germany