Nature Communications (Jun 2016)

Cardiac sodium channel palmitoylation regulates channel availability and myocyte excitability with implications for arrhythmia generation

  • Zifan Pei,
  • Yucheng Xiao,
  • Jingwei Meng,
  • Andy Hudmon,
  • Theodore R. Cummins

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms12035
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 7, no. 1
pp. 1 – 13

Abstract

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Cardiac voltage-gated sodium channels (Nav1.5) are crucial regulators of heart electric activity. Here the authors show that palmitoylation, a process of lipid modification of cysteine residues, modulates Nav1.5 function and affects cardiomyocyte excitability, representing a potential target in treating cardiac diseases.