Brain water transport: A key role for AQP4 – or not?
Event details
| Date | 25.11.2011 |
| Hour | 12:00 |
| Speaker | Prof. Nanna MacAulay, Department of Cellular and Molecular Medicine, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Copenhagen |
| Location |
SV1717A
|
| Category | Conferences - Seminars |
The water in the mammalian brain is continuously shifted between the circulating blood, the cerebrospinal fluid, and the brain parenchyma as well as between different compartments and cellular structures within the brain tissue. The molecular mechanisms responsible for the maintenance of the cerebral water homeostasis are poorly understood and so is their involvement in the glial and neuronal cell swelling observed during stroke. Substances such as vasopressin and glutamate are released during cerebral ischemia and contribute to the associated brain water accumulation and cell swelling. This has been proposed to take effect by short-term regulation of aquaporin 4 (AQP4) via phosphorylation.
The talk will focus on the lack of evidence in favor of phosphorylation-dependent gating of AQP4. An alternative mode of water transport across cell membranes will be introduced as the keeper of brain water homeostasis; cotransport of water. Water transport by this alternative pathway is independent of the osmotic gradients strictly required for AQP-dependent water flux as it cotransports water along with the translocation of substrate.
Practical information
- General public
- Free
Contact
- Pascal Jourdain