title: The cystic fibrosis transmembrane recruiter the alter ego of CFTR as a multi-kinase anchor.
abstract: This review focuses on a newly discovered interaction between protein kinases involved in cellular energetics, a process that may be disturbed in cystic fibrosis for unknown reasons. I propose a new model where kinase-mediated cellular transmission of energy provides mechanistic insight to a latent role of the cystic fibrosis transmembrane conductance regulator (CFTR). I suggest that CFTR acts as a multi-kinase recruiter to the apical epithelial membrane. My group finds that, in the cytosol, two protein kinases involved in cell energy homeostasis, nucleoside diphosphate kinase (NDPK) and AMP-activated kinase (AMPK), bind one another. Preliminary data suggest that both can also bind CFTR (function unclear). The disrupted role of this CFTR-kinase complex as 'membrane transmitter to the cell' is proposed as an alternative paradigm to the conventional ion transport mediated and CFTR/chloride-centric view of cystic fibrosis pathogenesis. Chloride remains important, but instead, chloride-induced control of the phosphohistidine content of one kinase component (NDPK, via a multi-kinase complex that also includes a third kinase, CK2; formerly casein kinase 2). I suggest that this complex provides the necessary near-equilibrium conditions needed for efficient transmission of phosphate energy to proteins controlling cellular energetics. Crucially, a new role for CFTR as a kinase controller is proposed with ionic concentration acting as a signal. The model posits a regulatory control relay for energy sensing involving a cascade of protein kinases bound to CFTR.
authors.affiliation: Department of Maternal and Child Health Sciences, University of Dundee, Ninewells Hospital, Dundee DD1 9SY, UK. a.mehta@dundee.ac.uk
authors.forename: Anil
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Mehta
mesh_terms: D003550:Cystic Fibrosis / Q000503:physiopathology*; D019005:Cystic Fibrosis Transmembrane Conductance Regulator / Q000502:physiology*; D004734:Energy Metabolism / Q000502:physiology; D006706:Homeostasis / Q000502:physiology; D006801:Humans; D011485:Protein Binding / Q000502:physiology; D011494:Protein Kinases / Q000502:physiology*