The Rockefeller University - Laboratory of Sensory Neuroscience

Hair Cells of the Inner Ear

Screening for Zebrafish Mutations Affecting
Hearing and Balance

Mutation of the Zebrafish's choroideremia Gene
Causes Hair-Cell Degeneration

Paravalbumin 3, A Potent Ca²⁺ Buffer in Hair Cells

Spontaneous Oscillation by Hair Bundles

Electrical Stimulation of Hair-Bundle Movement

Electron-Microscopic Tomographic Analysis of
the Transduction Element

Radixin in the hair bundle

Dynamical instability and the ear's active process

Friday, July 25, 2008

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Radixin in the hair bundle

Proteins of the ezrin-radixin-moesin (ERM) family are ubiquitous constituents of the submembrane cortex, especially of epithelial cells, where they link membrane proteins to underlying actin filaments. When used in immunocytochemical studies of isolated hair cells, an antiserum directed against radixin produces an intense band of labeling at the bases of hair bundles from the chicken, frog, mouse, and zebrafish. Electron-microscopic immunocytochemistry discloses that radixin labeling commences in the stereociliary taper, peaks in the lower stereociliary shaft, and declines progressively toward the hair bundle's top. Radixin is thus a prominent constituent of stereocilia, where it may participate in anchoring actin filaments to the membrane.