PKCδ deficiency inhibits fetal development and is associated with heart elastic fiber hyperplasia and lung inflammation in adult PKCδ knockout mice.

Protein kinase C-delta (PKCδ) has a caspase-3 recognition sequence in its structure, suggesting its involvement in apoptosis. In addition, PKCδ was recently reported to function as an anti-cancer factor. The generation of a PKCδ knockout mouse model indicated that PKCδ plays a role in B cell homeostasis.

New PKCdelta family members, PKCdeltaIV, deltaV, deltaVI, and deltaVII are specifically expressed in mouse testis.

We isolated and characterized four new PKCdelta isoforms, PKCdeltaIV, deltaV, deltaVI, and deltaVII, specifically expressed in the mouse testis. These isoforms possess neither V1 nor C2-like domains. Moreover, PKCdeltaVI and deltaVII have a different last exon as their V5 domain.

Galactosylceramide expression factor-1 induces myogenesis in MDCK and C3H10T1/2 cells.

We previously reported that galactosylceramide expression factor-1 (GEF-1), a rat homolog of hepatocyte growth factor-regulated tyrosine kinase substrate (Hrs/Hgs), induces galactosylceramide and/or sulfatide expression and morphological changes in epithelial cells. Here, we show that GEF-1 induces myogenesis in MDCK and C3H10T1/2 cells. GEF-1 overexpression in MDCK cells (MDCK/GEF-1) appeared to promote trans-differentiation to myoblasts that expressed MyoD and myosin heavy chain (MHC).

PKC zeta II, a small molecule of protein kinase C zeta, specifically expressed in the mouse brain.

Protein kinase C zeta (PKCzeta) plays critical roles in neural development. In the brain, many PKCzeta-related transcripts are expressed but they do not code the native 75 kDa PKCzeta molecule. We examined the significance of such transcripts in intact cells.