Cell contractility

Myosin II is in the same subfamily as the myosins in muscle thick filaments and it forms large, two-headed myosins with two light chains per heavy chain. Although myosin II is abundantly expressed in brain, little is known about its function in the nervous system. In other nonmuscle cells, myosin II has been implicated in many types of cellular contractility and may serve a similar function in developing neurons. However, myosin II remains abundant in the mature nervous system, where examples of cell contractility are less common. 

Yin A thrombin-receptor is fashioned by virtue of the duplication of a gene for a [protein region that will stick in a cell membrane]. Cleavage by the TF-activated prothrombin effects cell contractility or clumping. 

Sarcoma cells Contractile protein from undifferentiated cells 0.1-0.2 Hoffmann-Berling (1956)... 

Rockey, D.C. The cellular pathogenesis of portal hypertension stellate cell contractility, endothelin and nitric oxide. Hepatology 1997 25 2-5... 

Potassium is a cofactor and activates a large variety of enzymes, including glycerol dehydrogenase, pyruvate kinase, L-threonine dehydrase, and ATPase. Its acute toxicity is primarily due to its action as an electrolyte. Excessive or diminished potassium levels can disrupt membrane excitability and influence muscle cell contractility and neuronal excitability. 

Slow Calcium Channel Blockers (SCCBs), which are also referred to as calcium entry blockers and even, erroneously, as calcium antagonists, are a number of marketed drugs, several of which have no chemical relationship to the others. They will be discussed in some detail with the anti-anginal drugs (see later). At this point, suffice it to state that their antihypertensive effect is due to their ability to modulate the influx of Ca2+ across the cell membrane of the arterial smooth muscle. This will reduce Ca2+-promoted activation of the cells contractile proteins, leading to vasodilation. 

Helfman, D. M., Levy, E. T, Berthier, C., Shtutman, M., Riveline, D., Grosheva, L, Lachish-Zalait, A., Elbaum, M. and Bershadsky, A. D. Caldesmon inhibits nonmuscle cell contractility and interferes with the formation of focal adhesions. Mol Biol Cell 10, 3097-3112,1999. 

At the early stage of the development of the heart-on-a-chip, a PDMS microfluidic network was combined with planar electrode array to measure the extracellular potential from individual adult cardiomyocytes [54]. Another microfluidic device with an array of electrodes was developed to electrically measure the metabolic profile of cardiomyocytes and optically measure cell contractility [55]. Grosberg et al. first introduced a tissue level heart-on-a-chip to measure the contractility of neonatal cardiac muscle tissue [52]. In the design, eight muscular thin films (MTF) were fabricated on a chip. A layer of poly(N-isopropylacrylamide) (PIPAAm) dissolved at below 35 °C is spin-coated on top of a glass slide (Fig. 5A). Subsequently, a PDMS layer was coated on top of the PIPAAM layer. The PDMS layer was used to seed neonatal rat ventricular cardiomyocytes. The substrate seeded with cells is placed in the bath and the film layers were manually cut to fabricate an array of two opposite rows of four rectangular film layers of MTFs. The MTFs are peeled off after PIPAAm is dissolved as a solution when kept below 35 °C. Finally, electrodes are placed on the top and the bottom of MTFs. 

HDAC8 Nucleus, C5rtoplasm Smooth muscle cell contractility... 

Polte, T.R. et al.. Extracellular matrix controls myosin light chain phosphorylation and cell contractility through modulation of ceU shape and cytoskeletal prestress. Am. J. Physiol. Cell Physiol, 286, C518, 2004. 

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