New components of machinery that carries genetic information fr...( - called the Nuclear Pore Complex -- a ...)

Especially intriguing, said York, is that inositol signals are not absolutely necessary for mRNA to leave the nucleus, except at high temperatures.

"One idea is that this process is involved only in transport of specific genes that are needed to help cells adapt to stress, such as heating," he said.

Future studies will aim at identifying the protein that is the target of the IP6 signal and how it affects that protein to act as a switch. More broadly, the discovery of the two kinases has helped open up an important new research pathway, emphasized York.

"This discovery really challenges the idea that IP3 was the sole signal coming from this pathway," he said. "In fact, we know now it's not. Now we know that while this pathway begins by affecting calcium, it ends with the export of mRNA from the nucleus as mediated by IP6. We now want to find out what are the signaling roles of each molecules along this pathway, and in fact whether there's a signal after IP6."

Even broader, said York, the research offers even more hints that inositols have extremely complex signaling roles, including specialized roles in different compartments of the cell and at different times.

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Contact: Dennis Meredith
Dennis.meredith@duke.edu
919-681-8054
Duke University
2-Jul-1999