Grant: Operating Grant

The experiments set out in this study are aimed at understanding the regulation of a particular kind of cardiac potassium ion channel that is essential for the maintenance of normal cardiac repolarization. In order to examine the functioning of this channel in fine detail, the genes for the channel will be expressed and particular structural features will be altered or swapped between channels. These modified channels will be labeled with tracking probes at specific positions in order to investigate exactly how different parts of the channels change their positions as the channel pores open and close and how that opening and closing of the channel pores is regulated. The channel to be studied is called IKs, and has a vital role in maintaining the normal heart rhythm. It normally opens during the heartbeat to allow potassium ions out of the heart cells and underlies the beginning of the relaxation process that allows the heart to rest between beats. This protein is made up of two or three subunits which greatly affect its behavior when they combine with it. The aims of the present work are to fully understand how the main protein subunit interacts with its partners to produce the activity that we observe in the heart