We have proposed that since the type II pyrethroids deltamethrin and cypermethrin, but not the type I pyrethroid cismethrin act on chloride channels, this could contribute to the bimodal nature of pyrethroid poisoning syndromes. We now examine a wider range of pyrethroid structures on the activity of these calcium-independent voltage-gated maxi-chloride channels. Excised inside-out membrane pat...

Cholera toxin (CT), a virulence factor elaborated by Vibrio cholerae, is sufficient to induce the severe diarrhea characteristic of cholera. The enzymatic moiety of CT (CtxA) increases cAMP synthesis in intestinal epithelial cells, leading to chloride ion (Cl(-)) efflux through the CFTR Cl(-) channel. To preserve electroneutrality and osmotic balance, sodium ions and water also flow into the in...

Salt provides 2 life-essential elements: sodium and chlorine. Chloride, the ionic form of chlorine, derived exclusively from dietary absorption and constituting the most abundant anion in the human body, plays critical roles in many vital physiologic functions, from fluid retention and secretion to osmotic maintenance and pH balance. However, an often overlooked role of chloride is its function...

BACKGROUND The hERG potassium channel can modulate the proliferation of the chronic myelogenous leukemic K562 cells, and its role in the erythroid differentiation of K562 cells still remains unclear. PRINCIPAL FINDINGS The hERG potassium channel blockage by a new 36-residue scorpion toxin BmKKx2, a potent hERG channel blocker with IC50 of 6.7 ± 1.7 nM, enhanced the erythroid differentiation o...

in the pathogenesis of secretory diarrhea. It is a passive process driven by the active secretion of ion, predominantly chloride. The cellular transport mechanism of intestinal chloride secretion is well defined. Chloride is taken up across the basolateral membrane via a Na /K /2Cl cotransporter (NKCC1) and exits across the apical membrane via cAMP-sensitive (CFTR) and calcium-sensitive (CaCC) ...

The Maxi-chloride channel was the first ion channel described by electrophysiological methods in placenta. Because it is difficult to access a complex epithelium such as the placenta for electrophysiological procedures, the studies of ion channels from placental membranes have been performed only very recently. It was only in 1993 that a direct demonstration of a high-conductance chloride chann...

The time course of currents mediated by native and recombinant glycine receptors was examined with a combination of rapid agonist applications to outside-out patches and single-channel recording. The deactivation time constant of currents evoked by brief, saturating pulses of glycine is profoundly affected by the chloride concentration on the intracellular side of the cell membrane. Deactivatio...

The well known chloride channel from Torpedo has been a round since 1979 (White and Miller, 1979), but it continues to supply us with new surprises. In this issue of The Journal of General Physiology Chen and Miller analyze in great detail the voltageand chloride-dependent activation mechanism of the peculiar "double-barreled" channel (Chen and Miller, 1996), which turns out to be completely di...