title: Role of peripherin/rds in vertebrate photoreceptor architecture and inherited retinal degenerations.
abstract: The vertebrate photoreceptor outer segment (OS) is a highly structured and dynamic organelle specialized to transduce light signals. The elaborate membranous architecture of the OS requires peripherin/rds (P/rds), an integral membrane protein and tetraspanin protein family member. Gene-level defects in P/rds cause a broad variety of late-onset progressive retinal degenerations in humans and dysmorphic photoreceptors in murine and Xenopus models. Although proposed to fulfill numerous roles related to OS structural stability and renewal, P/rds molecular function remains uncertain. An increasingly resolved model of this protein's oligomeric structure can account for disease inheritance patterns and severity in some instances. Nonetheless, the pathogenic mechanisms underlying the uniquely broad spectrum of retinal diseases associated with P/rds defects are not currently well understood. Recent findings point to the possibility that P/rds acts as a multifunctional scaffolding protein for OS architecture and that partial-loss-of-function mutations contribute to the hallmark phenotypic heterogeneity associated with inherited defects in RDS.
authors.affiliation: Eye Research Institute, Oakland University, Rochester, Michigan 48309, USA.
authors.forename: Andrew F X
authors.initials: AF
authors.lastname: Goldberg
mesh_terms: D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D000818:Animals; D006801:Humans; D007381:Intermediate Filament Proteins / Q000235:genetics / Q000502:physiology*; D007425:Intracellular Membranes / Q000378:metabolism*; D008562:Membrane Glycoproteins / Q000235:genetics / Q000502:physiology*; D008565:Membrane Proteins; D051379:Mice; D008953:Models, Anatomic; D008954:Models, Biological; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D009154:Mutation; D009419:Nerve Tissue Proteins / Q000235:genetics / Q000502:physiology*; D064531:Peripherins; D020419:Photoreceptor Cells, Vertebrate / Q000737:chemistry / Q000502:physiology*; D012162:Retinal Degeneration / Q000235:genetics*; D017386:Sequence Homology, Amino Acid; D029867:Xenopus Proteins
chemical_list: D007381:Intermediate Filament Proteins; D008562:Membrane Glycoproteins; D008565:Membrane Proteins; D009419:Nerve Tissue Proteins; C578995:PRPH protein, Xenopus; C578994:PRPH protein, human; C578997:PRPH2 protein, human; D064531:Peripherins; C578996:Prph2 protein, mouse; D029867:Xenopus Proteins