Nicotinic acetylcholine receptor and the structural basis of neuromuscular transmission: insights from Torpedo postsynaptic membranes.

ABSTRACT: The nicotinic acetylcholine (ACh) receptor, at the neuromuscular junction, is a neurotransmitter-gated ion channel that has been fine-tuned through evolution to transduce a chemical signal into an electrical signal with maximum efficiency and speed. It is composed from three similar and two identical polypeptide chains, arranged in a ring around a narrow membrane pore. Central to the design of this assembly is a hydrophobic gate in the pore, more than 50 Å away from sites in the extracellular domain where ACh binds. Although the molecular properties of the receptor have been explored intensively over the last few decades, only recently have structures emerged revealing its complex architecture and illuminating how ACh entering the binding sites opens the distant gate. Postsynaptic membrane

SUBMITTER: Unwin N 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3820380 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature