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Intercellular communication and tissue growth: IX. Junctional membrane structure of hybrids between communication-competent and communication-incompetent cells

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Summary

The structure of the membrane junctions of the hybrid cell system, examined in the companion paper in respect to competence for communication through cell-to-cell membrane channels, is here examined by freeze-fracture electron microscopy. The junctions of the channel-competent parent cell and of the channel-competent hybrid cells present aggregates of intramembranous particles typical of “gap junction”; those of the channel-incompetent parent cell and channel-incompetent segregant hybrid cells do not. Competence for junctional communication and for gap junction formation are genetically related. The junctions of the intermediate hybrid cells with incomplete channel-competence (characterized by cell-to-cell transfer of small inorganic ions but not of fluorescein), present special intramembranous fibrillar structures instead of discrete gap-junctional particles. The possibility that these structures may constitute coupling elements with subnormal permeability is discussed in terms of incomplete dominance of the genetic determinants of gap junction.

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  1. W. J. Larsen

    Present address: Department of Anatomy, University of Iowa, 52242, Iowa City, Iowa

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Physiology and Biophysics, University of Miami School of Medicine, 33152, Miami, Florida

    W. J. Larsen, R. Azarnia & W. R. Loewenstein

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  1. W. J. Larsen
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  2. R. Azarnia
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  3. W. R. Loewenstein
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Larsen, W.J., Azarnia, R. & Loewenstein, W.R. Intercellular communication and tissue growth: IX. Junctional membrane structure of hybrids between communication-competent and communication-incompetent cells. J. Membrain Biol. 34, 39–54 (1977). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01870292

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01870292

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