{"doi":"10.7554/elife.59055","title":"Activation of the archaeal ion channel MthK is exquisitely regulated by temperature","abstract":"Physiological response to thermal stimuli in mammals is mediated by a structurally diverse class of ion channels, many of which exhibit polymodal behavior. To probe the diversity of biophysical mechanisms of temperature-sensitivity, we characterized the temperature-dependent activation of MthK, a two transmembrane calcium-activated potassium channel from thermophilic archaebacteria. Our functional complementation studies show that these channels are more efficient at rescuing K + transport at 37°C than at 24°C. Electrophysiological activity of the purified MthK is extremely sensitive (Q 10 >100) to heating particularly at low-calcium concentrations whereas channels lacking the calcium-sensing RCK domain are practically insensitive. By analyzing single-channel activities at limiting calcium concentrations, we find that temperature alters the coupling between the cytoplasmic RCK domains and the pore domain. These findings reveal a hitherto unexplored mechanism of temperature-dependent regulation of ion channel gating and shed light on ancient origins of temperature-sensitivity.","journal":"eLife","year":2020,"id":80726,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":15,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9527,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2020-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":418189,"name":"Vinay Idikuda","orcid":"0000-0001-6324-5839","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":418190,"name":"Sandipan Chowdhury","orcid":"0000-0002-0695-7968","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":418191,"name":"Baron Chanda","orcid":"0000-0003-4954-7034","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":418188,"name":"Yihao Jiang","orcid":"0000-0001-7694-3089","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":74,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-18T21:51:58.988919Z","pmid":"33274718","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}