Smooth-muscle endoplasmic reticulum contains a cardiac-like form of calsequestrin

It is proposed that smooth-muscle endoplasmic reticulum contains calsequestrin and that this protein in smooth muscle resembles cardiac calsequestrin more than the skeletal-muscle form. This proposal is based on seven similarities between the smooth-muscle protein and cardiac calsequestrin. Proteins with an Mr of 55,000 can be extracted from the membranes of smooth muscle and of cardiac muscle using 100 mM Na2CO3. The protein from smooth muscle binds to phenyl-Sepharose in the absence of Ca2+ and is released by 10 mM CaCl2, as has been observed for cardiac calsequestrin. The protein from smooth muscle comigrates with the cardiac calsequestrin on Laemmli-type SDS-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis. The protein of Mr 55,000 from smooth muscle and cardiac calsequestrin both strain blue with the carbocyanine dye Stains-all. Both proteins present similar one-dimensional Cleveland peptide maps although minor differences might exist. From an analysis of subcellular membranes separated by sucrose gradient centrifugation it is concluded that the protein with Mr 55,000 from the smooth muscle is confined to the endoplasmic reticulum, the same subcellular structure from which, in heart muscle, calsequestrin can be isolated. Antibodies raised against canine cardiac calsequestrin bind to a protein of similar Mr in smooth-muscle endoplasmic reticulum. In addition to the calsequestrin, three other extrinsic proteins with an Mr of 130,000, 100,000 and 63,000, stain blue with Stains-all and occur in the endoplasmic reticulum of smooth muscle.