Effects of Lipid Composition and Alcohol on BK Channel Function.

The Treistman laboratory is generally interested in exploring the mechanisms which underlie the ability of physiological doses of alcohol to alter the functional properties of certain neuronal membranes. Although changes in lipid properties were long thought to be responsible for the reduction in neuronal excitability observed with drug application we have recently demonstrated that alcohol also has direct effects on the transmembrane proteins that are responsible for current flow across nerve membranes. Nerve lipids and proteins are inextricably intertwined so that it is unlikely that a drug will fail to interact with both substrates.

Our specific research interest centers on the role of lipid composition on the electrophysiological properties of the transmembrane BK Channel, itself reconstituted into artificial bilayers. This channel is known to play a large role in determining neuronal excitablility. With this lipid information as a base we next hope to determine how alcohol, which in some lipid compositions is known to alter channel function, changes these basic properties. At the moment we find rather large alterations in BK channel conductance and activation, with changes in lipid composition. It also appears, in preliminary experiments, that alcohol's effect on BK channel properties can be altered by simply changing lipid composition. We hope to determine the physical properties of the bilayer that are responsible for these effects.

Education
Ph. D Southeast University, Nanjing, China, 1997
B. Sc. Fudan University, Shanghai, China, 1991

Selected Publications

Yuan,C., R.J.O'Connell, P.L.Feinberg-Zadek, L.J.Johnston, and S.N.Treistman. 2004. Bilayer thickness modulates the conductance of the BK channel in model membranes. Biophys. J. 86:3620-3633.

Chunbo Yuan, Jennifer Furlong, Pierre Burgos, Linda J. Johnston, The Size of Lipid Rafts: An Atomic Force Microscopy Study of Ganglioside GM1 Domains in Sphingomyelin/DOPC/ Cholesterol Membranes. Biophys. J. 2002 82: 2526-2535

Chunbo Yuan, Linda, J. Johnston, Phase Evolution in Cholesterol/DPPC Monolayers: AFM and NSOM studies, J. Microscopy, 2002, 205, 136-146

Chunbo Yuan, Linda, J. Johnston, Ganglioside GM1 domains in phosphatidylcholine/cholesterol membranes: the size of lipid-rafts. Biophys. J. 2001, 81, 1059-1069.

Chunbo Yuan, Linda, J. Johnston, The distribution of ganglioside(GM1) in DPPC/cholesterol monolayers by AFM: a model for lipid rafts. Biophys. J. 2000, 79, 2768-2781.

Chunbo, Yuan, Aileen, Chen, Pamela. Kolb, and Vincent T. Moy, Energy landscape of streptavidin-biotin complexes measured by atomic force microscopy, Biochemistry, 2000, 39, 10219-10223.