New Insight Into the Controls on a Go...(wed up by calpain. Calpastatin's surviva...),Health

The researchers' structural information also showed how calpain changes its shape once it is activated by calcium and how this transformation renders it a target of calpastatin attachment and thus inhibition.

"This new structural information on calpastatin and on calpain's conformational changes not only explains a lot about calpain's regulation," Green said. "It also gives us information we can use to develop targets for drugs that could either activate or inhibit calpain."

Kalle Gehring of McGill University in Montreal is also an author of this paper.

This research was supported in part by the National Institutes of Health, the Canadian Institute of Health Research and ALSAC.

St. Jude Children's ResearchHospital

St. Jude Children's Research Hospital is internationally recognized for its pioneering work in finding cures and saving children with cancer and other catastrophic diseases. Founded by late entertainer Danny Thomas and based in Memphis, Tenn., St. Jude freely shares its discoveries with scientific and medical communities around the world. No family ever pays for treatments not covered by insurance, and families without insurance are never asked to pay. St. Jude is financially supported by ALSAC, its fundraising organization. For more information, please visit www.stjude.org.