High impact information on KERA

• Keratocytes in the corneal stroma express keratan sulfate-containing proteoglycans including cornea-specific keratocan [1].
• Keratocytes normally express high levels of aldehyde dehydrogenase and keratocan [2].
• Keratocan expression of murine keratocytes is maintained on amniotic membrane by down-regulating transforming growth factor-beta signaling [1].
• In contrast, cells expanded on human amniotic membrane (AM) stromal matrix maintained a three-dimensional dendritic morphology and expressed keratocan mRNA and protein for at least 8 passages before senescence [1].
• Bovine cornea contains three unique keratan sulfate proteoglycans (KSPGs), of which two (lumican and keratocan) have been characterized using molecular cloning [3].

Biological context of KERA

• Molecular cloning and tissue distribution of keratocan. Bovine corneal keratan sulfate proteoglycan 37A [4].
• The bovine Kera gene has a TATA box that is located 28bp upstream from tsp [5].
• The Kera gene is composed of three exons and two introns that span 8.830kb of the bovine genome [5].
• The interaction of lumican and keratocan with the stably folded triple helix provided by hydroxylation may also serve to stabilize these proteoglycans [6].
• These results indicate that bovine keratocytes, when cultured under serum-free conditions, produce the four known leucine-rich proteoglycans decorin, keratocan, lumican, and osteoglycin/mimecan and maintain a phenotype that is comparable to that of in situ keratocytes [7].

Anatomical context of KERA

• Keratocan is abundant in cornea and sclera and detected in much lesser amounts in skin, ligament, cartilage, artery, and striated muscles [4].
• This phenotypic change in activated corneal stromal cells is induced by bFGF/HS and by TGF-beta1, and it accompanies the downregulation of keratocan expression [8].

Associations of KERA with chemical compounds

• Only in cornea was keratocan found to contain large, sulfated keratan sulfate chains [4].
• Keratocan, like lumican, is a core protein of a major corneal proteoglycan but is present in non-corneal tissues primarily as a nonsulfated glycoprotein [4].

Other interactions of KERA

• RESULTS: Insulin stimulated the synthesis of collagen but did not affect the accumulation of lumican and keratocan [6].

Analytical, diagnostic and therapeutic context of KERA

• Northern hybridization and immunoblotting of tissue extracts found keratocan distribution to be more limited than that of lumican or fibromodulin [4].
• Cytosolic aldehyde dehydrogenase and keratocan accumulated in the medium were quantified by Western blot [2].

References