title: A new variant of proline-rich membrane anchor (PRiMA) of acetylcholinesterase in chicken: expression in different muscle fiber types.
abstract: Proline-rich membrane anchor (PRiMA) is a molecule to organize acetylcholinesterase (AChE) into tetrameric globular form (G(4)) that anchors onto the plasma membrane in brain and muscle. In mammal, PRiMA is encoded by a single gene with two splicing variants, PRiMA I and PRiMA II: PRiMA II is different to PRiMA I by its absence of a C-terminal cytoplasmic domain. The existence of these isoforms has not been revealed in avian specie. By using RT-PCR and bioinformatic analyses, two splicing variants of PRiMA were identified in chicken cerebrum. One variant contains very similar domains as compared to mammalian PRiMA I. The other variant, named as PRiMA II, has a very distinct cytoplasmic C-terminus of having 26 amino acids. Both forms of chicken PRiMA were able to organize the formation of G(4) AChE when that was over expressed together with AChE(T) subunit in cultured cells. The level of PRiMA mRNA, mainly PRiMA I, was higher in slow-twitch muscle than that of in fast-twitch muscle of chicken. This finding suggests that the muscle fiber type-specific expression of G(4) AChE in chicken could be a result of the different expression pattern of PRiMA in fast- and slow-twitch muscles.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biology and Center for Chinese Medicine, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Clear Water Bay Road, Hong Kong, SAR, China.
authors.forename: Mokka K W
authors.initials: MK
authors.lastname: Mok
authors.forename: Ka W
authors.initials: KW
authors.lastname: Leung
authors.forename: Heidi Q
authors.initials: HQ
authors.lastname: Xie
authors.forename: Ava J Y
authors.initials: AJ
authors.lastname: Guo
authors.forename: Vicky P
authors.initials: VP
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.forename: Judy T T
authors.initials: JT
authors.lastname: Zhu
authors.forename: Roy C Y
authors.initials: RC
authors.lastname: Choi
authors.forename: Karl W K
authors.initials: KW
authors.lastname: Tsim
mesh_terms: D000110:Acetylcholinesterase / Q000378:metabolism*; D017398:Alternative Splicing; D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D000818:Animals; D002645:Chickens; D019295:Computational Biology; D008565:Membrane Proteins / Q000096:biosynthesis* / Q000235:genetics; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D018656:Muscle Fibers, Fast-Twitch / Q000378:metabolism*; D018657:Muscle Fibers, Slow-Twitch / Q000378:metabolism*; D020033:Protein Isoforms / Q000096:biosynthesis / Q000235:genetics; D055503:Protein Multimerization; D017434:Protein Structure, Tertiary; D020133:Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction
chemical_list: D008565:Membrane Proteins; D020033:Protein Isoforms; D000110:Acetylcholinesterase