The Caenorhabditis elegans mucin-like protein OSM-8 negatively regulates osmosensitive physiology via the transmembrane protein PTR-23.

ABSTRACT: The molecular mechanisms of animal cell osmoregulation are poorly understood. Genetic studies of osmoregulation in yeast have identified mucin-like proteins as critical regulators of osmosensitive signaling and gene expression. Whether mucins play similar roles in higher organisms is not known. Here, we show that mutations in the Caenorhabditis elegans mucin-like gene osm-8 specifically disrupt osmoregulatory physiological processes. In osm-8 mutants, normal physiological responses to hypertonic stress, such as the accumulation of organic osmolytes and activation of osmoresponsive gene expression, are constitutively activated. As a result, osm-8 mutants exhibit resistance to normally lethal levels of hypertonic stress and have an osmotic stress resistance (Osr) phenotype. To identify genes

SUBMITTER: Rohlfing AK 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3017116 | biostudies-literature | 2011 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature