title: Essential role of vesicular nucleotide transporter in vesicular storage and release of nucleotides in platelets.
abstract: Nucleotides are stored in the dense granules of platelets. The release of nucleotides triggers one of the first steps in a series of cascades responsible for blood coagulation. However, the mechanism of how the nucleotides are accumulated in the granules is still far less understood. The transporter protein responsible for storage of nucleotides in the neuroendocrine cells has been identified and characterized. We hypothesized that the vesicular nucleotide transporter (VNUT) is also involved in the vesicular storage of nucleotides in platelets. In this article, we present three lines of evidence that VNUT is responsible for the vesicular storage of nucleotides in platelets and that vesicular ATP transport is crucial for platelet function, detection and characterization of VNUT activity in platelets isolated from healthy humans and MEG-01 cells, RNA interference experiments on MEG-01 cells, and studies on nucleotide transport and release with a selective inhibitor.
authors.affiliation: Department of Membrane Biochemistry, Okayama University Graduate School of Medicine, Dentistry and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Okayama, Japan.
authors.forename: Miki
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Hiasa
authors.affiliation: Department of Membrane Biochemistry, Okayama University Graduate School of Medicine, Dentistry and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Okayama, Japan.
authors.forename: Natsuko
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Togawa
authors.affiliation: Advanced Science Research Center, Okayama University, Okayama, Japan.
authors.forename: Takaaki
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Miyaji
authors.affiliation: Department of Membrane Biochemistry, Okayama University Graduate School of Medicine, Dentistry and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Okayama, Japan.
authors.forename: Hiroshi
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Omote
authors.affiliation: Department of Cell Biology, Nagahama Institute of Technology, Nagahama, Japan.
authors.forename: Akitsugu
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Yamamoto
authors.affiliation: Department of Membrane Biochemistry, Okayama University Graduate School of Medicine, Dentistry and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Okayama, Japan Advanced Science Research Center, Okayama University, Okayama, Japan.
authors.forename: Yoshinori
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Moriyama
keywords: ADP; ATP; SLC17A9; platelets; vesicular nucleotide transporter