GJB2: gap junction protein b2 KID: keratitis-ichthyosis-deafness INTRODUCTION Keratitis-ichthyosis-deafness (KID) syndrome is a rare genodermatosis with approximately 100 published cases. Although it is classified as an autosomal dominant disorder, more than 90% of cases are caused by sporadic mutations predominantly in gap junction protein b2 (GJB2) on chromosome 13q11-q12 (OMIM 148210). GJB2 ...

Interneuronal gap junctional coupling is a hallmark of neural development whose functional significance is poorly understood. We have characterized the extent of electrical coupling and dye coupling and patterns of gap junction protein expression in lumbar spinal motor neurons of neonatal rats. Intracellular recordings showed that neonatal motor neurons are transiently electrically coupled and ...

In addition to chemical synaptic transmission, neurons that are connected by gap junctions can also communicate rapidly via electrical synaptic transmission. Increasing evidence indicates that gap junctions not only permit electrical current flow and synchronous activity between interconnected or coupled cells, but that the strength or effectiveness of electrical communication between coupled c...

Luteinizing hormone (LH) acts on ovarian follicles to reinitiate meiosis in prophase-arrested mammalian oocytes, and this has been proposed to occur by interruption of a meioisis-inhibitory signal that is transmitted through gap junctions into the oocyte from the somatic cells that surround it. To investigate this idea, we microinjected fluorescent tracers into live antral follicle-enclosed mou...

Gap junctional communication provides a mechanism for regulating multicellular activities by allowing the exchange of small diffusible molecules between neighboring cells. The diversity of gap junction proteins may exist to form channels that have different permeability properties. We report here that induction of terminal differentiation in mouse primary keratinocytes by calcium results in a s...