Immunolocalization of calcium vector protein and its target protein in amphioxus.

Three proteins, sarcoplasmic Ca(2+)-binding protein (SCP), Ca2+ vector protein (CaVP) and its target protein (CaVPT), are found abundantly in the higher invertebrate amphioxus. Whereas the function of SCP is likely to be related to Ca2+ and Mg2+ buffering, that of the latter two proteins, apparently linked together, is still not clear. In this study, affinity-purified polyclonal antibodies to these three proteins were used to study the extractability under physiological ionic conditions, the distribution in different tissues and the immunocytochemical localization in striated muscle. Our data show that SCP is essentially cytosolic whereas CaVP and CaVPT are partially associated with non-soluble components in amphioxus tissues. The tissue distribution, studied in transverse sections, shows that SCP is merely confined to striated muscle, whereas CaVP and CaVPT are also abundant in other tissues such as the spinal chord and the gonads. Thus the protein pair CaVP/CaVPT is likely to serve a general role in many tissues; however, no strict correlation was found in the distribution of the latter two proteins, suggesting that they may function independently. The detailed cytochemical localization of the three proteins in longitudinal sections of striated muscle revealed a discrete striation pattern in addition to a diffuse background. For SCP these striations are coincident with the Z line. The immunostaining for CaVP shows intense striations at the level of the Z lines alternating with weak striations at the M lines. For CaVPT the striations at the Z and M line are more or less of equal intensity, leading to a pattern with a 1 micron periodicity.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)