Dear Colleagues,
We are delighted to announce that Calreticulin Workshop,
devoted to the structure and function of calreticulin and
related proteins, will take place on March 31 - April 2,
1998 in Banff, Alberta, Canada. The Workshop will provide
unique opportunity to meet and interact with the scientists
interested in calreticulin research in spectacular
surroundings of Banff National Park in Canadian Rocky
Mountains. We are sure that the Banff Calreticulin Workshop
will be an important forum to share the latest findings and
to develop future interactions. Calreticulin has been
implicated to play a role in almost every aspect of cell
biology as outlined in a brief overview below. We hope that
the Workshop will be useful to sort out some of the latest
discoveries and controversies concerning calreticulin and
implication of this protein in a variety of biological
systems. On the behalf of the Organizing Committee we would
like to invite you to participate in the Workshop.
The Calreticulin Workshop is a satellite meeting to the 8th
Fisher Winternational Symposium on Cellular and Molecular
Biology which will be held April 2-5, 1998, also at the
Banff Conference Centre. The Winternational Symposium,
which is co-sponsored by our Society and Fisher Scientific,
is held annually, with a different focus each year. The
theme for the 1998 meeting is: "Membrane Proteins in Health
and Disease." Further information about the meetings and
registration forms can be obtained by contacting:
Dr. Carol E. Cass, Chair
Winternational Symposium
Department of Oncology
University of Alberta
Cross Cancer Institute
Edmonton, Alberta T6G 1Z2
phone: (403)432-8320
fax: (403)432-8425
email: sherron.becker at cancerboard.ab.ca
website: http://www.csbmcb.ca
I hope you participate in Calreticulin Workshop. If you
would like to receive further information please send a
request as soon as possible (preferably by e-mail) to Michal
Opas at:
m.opas at utoronto.ca
or at:
Department of Anatomy & Cell Biology
University of Toronto
Medical Sciences Building
Toronto, Ontario, M5S 1A8 Canada
tel: (416) 978-8947
fax: (416) 978-3954
Please note that this is a "last call" for information
requests. I look forward to hearing from you in the near
future.
For The Organizing Committee
Sincerely yours
Michal Opas
Calreticulin, a multifunctional Ca-binding protein
Calreticulin, 60 kDa Ca-binding protein [1], is a major
component of the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) of non-muscle
cells [2-7]. The protein is of high physiological
importance as it knockout is embryonic lethal [8]. Along
with a wide tissue distribution [9], calreticulin is present
in diverse animal and plant species [10]. calreticulin is a
resident ER protein as demonstrated by a variety of
biochemical and immunological techniques [1,3,4,6,11]. The
protein is synthesized with an N-terminal signal sequence
and it terminates with the KDEL sequence [3,12] which is
responsible for retrieval of proteins to the lumen of the ER
[13,14].
Calreticulin functions in vivo as a Ca storage
protein [15,16]. It also has been well established that
calreticulin is a chaperone [17-21] and it shows similarity
in amino acid sequence to a part of calnexin, an ER membrane
chaperone [22]. The Ca storage and chaperone functions of
calreticulin are consistent with both the ER localization of
calreticulin and its structure. Stable overexpression of
calreticulin increases both cell-substratum and cell-cell
adhesiveness with concomitant upregulation of
adhesion-specific cytoskeletal protein, vinculin [23].
Upregulation of calreticulin also affects adhesion-dependent
phenomena such as cell motility (which decreases) and cell
spreading (which increases). Downregulation of calreticulin
brings about inverse effects. In addition to the Ca
storage and chaperone function, calreticulin modulates gene
expression [24,25]. In vitro, calreticulin interaction with
the DNA binding domain of the glucocorticoid receptor
prevents the receptor from interacting with its
glucocorticoid response element [24]. Transcriptional
activation by glucocorticoid and androgen receptors in vivo
is inhibited in cells overexpressing full length
calreticulin [24,25]. Calreticulin itself is
stress-regulated by heat and heavy metals [26-28].
Calreticulin has antithrombotic activity [29]. A host of
other putative calreticulin functions includes a role in
autoimmune diseases [30-34]. The protein affects
replication of the Rubella virus RNA [35,36]. In cytolytic
T lymphocytes it is found in the lytic granules where it may
play a role in killing of target cells [37]. In human
neutrophils calreticulin may contribute to the process of
phagocytosis [38]. In line with the reported functional
diversity, calreticulin was reported to be present in most
cellular compartments [10,11,37,39,40], including the outer
cell surface [41,42]. Recent hypotheses regarding
calreticulin function have been presented by Krause and
Michalak [43].
References
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Escherichia coli and identification of its Ca2+ binding
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synthesized human immunodeficiency virus type 1 envelope
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calreticulin promote folding, delay oligomerization and
suppress degradation of influenza hemagglutinin in
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22. Bergeron JJM, Brenner MB, Thomas DY, Williams DB:
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Wang F, Pan YC, Grunfeld S, Patton S, Malinski T, Stern DM,
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N-terminal domain. J Virol 1995, 69:3848-3851.
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Dr. Michal Opas
Department of Anatomy & Cell Biology
University of Toronto
1 King's College Circle
Medical Sciences Building
Toronto, Ontario, M5S 1A8 Canada
phone: (416) 978-8947
fax: (416) 978-3954
e-mail: m.opas at utoronto.ca
www homepage: http://www.utoronto.ca/anatomy/opas/start.htm
