PUBLICATION
Transmembrane channel-like (Tmc) subunits contribute to frequency sensitivity in the zebrafish utricle
- Authors
- Sun, P., Smith, E., Nicolson, T.
- ID
- ZDB-PUB-231114-8
- Date
- 2023
- Source
- The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience 44(1): (Journal)
- Registered Authors
- Nicolson, Teresa, Sun, Peng
- Keywords
- none
- MeSH Terms
-
- Animals
- Hair Cells, Auditory/physiology
- Mechanotransduction, Cellular*/physiology
- Membrane Proteins/metabolism
- Saccule and Utricle/metabolism
- Zebrafish*/metabolism
- PubMed
- 37952940 Full text @ J. Neurosci.
Citation
Sun, P., Smith, E., Nicolson, T. (2023) Transmembrane channel-like (Tmc) subunits contribute to frequency sensitivity in the zebrafish utricle. The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience. 44(1):.
Abstract
Information about dynamic head motion is conveyed by a central 'striolar' zone of vestibular hair cells and afferent neurons in the inner ear. How vestibular hair cells are tuned to transduce dynamic stimuli at the molecular level is not well understood. Here we take advantage of the differential expression pattern of tmc1, tmc2a and tmc2b, which encode subunits of the mechanotransduction complex in zebrafish vestibular hair cells. To test the role of various combinations of Tmc subunits in transducing dynamic head movements, we measured reflexive eye movements induced by high frequency stimuli in single versus double tmc mutants. We found that tmc2a correlates with the broadest range of frequency sensitivity, whereas tmc2b mainly contributes to lower frequency responses. tmc1, which is excluded from the striolar zone, plays a minor role in sensing lower frequency stimuli. Our study suggests that the Tmc subunits impart functional differences to mechanotransduction of dynamic stimuli.Significance Statement Information about dynamic head movements is transmitted by sensory receptors, known as hair cells, in the labyrinth of the inner ear. The sensitivity of hair cells to fast or slow movements of the head differs according to cell type. Whether the mechanotransduction complex that converts mechanical stimuli into electrical signals in hair cells participates in conveying frequency information is not clear. Here we find that the transmembrane channel like 1/2 genes, which encode a central component of the complex, are differentially expressed in the utricle and contribute to frequency sensitivity in zebrafish.
Genes / Markers
Expression
Phenotype
Mutations / Transgenics
Human Disease / Model
Sequence Targeting Reagents
Fish
Orthology
Engineered Foreign Genes
Mapping