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Updated: Aug 21, 2026

Measuring Transcellular Interactions through Protein Aggregation in a Heterologous Cell System
Published on: May 22, 2020
Neuregulin potentiates agrin-induced acetylcholine receptor clustering in myotubes
Shyuan T Ngo1, Caroline Balke, William D Phillips
1School of Biomedical Sciences, University of Queensland, St. Lucia 4072 QLD, Australia.
Abstract:
Agrin and neuregulin (HRG-beta1) play complementary roles in synapse formation. While HRG-beta1 induces transcriptional up-regulation of postsynaptic proteins, here we present evidence that it can potentiate agrin-induced acetylcholine receptor (AChR) clustering in C2 myotubes. Agrin induced maximal AChR clustering in 4 h. HRG-beta1 treatment for 4 h produced no increase over basal AChR cluster numbers. When myotubes were treated for 4 h with 100 pM agrin, HRG-beta1 augmented AChR cluster numbers by 2-fold compared to myotubes treated with 100 pM agrin alone. Thus, HRG-beta1 can potentiate agrin-induced AChR clustering.
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