Figure 3.

Intracellular calcium transients induced by P2 receptor agonists. Bath application of 30 μm ATP (A) and 2-MeS-ATP (MeSATP; B) induced larger changes in cytosolic calcium levels in fura-2 AM-loaded WT than in Cx43-null (KO) progenitor cells. The P2X₇R agonist BzATP (100 μm), however, was more effective in inducing Ca²⁺ changes in Cx43-null [knock-out (KO)] than in WT cells (C). Semiquantitative RT-PCR (D) showed that P2Y₁R mRNA levels in Cx43-null neurospheres (KO) are decreased by 50% compared with WT neurospheres.