Voltage-gated calcium channels (VGCCs), also known as voltage-dependent calcium channels (VDCCs), are a group of voltage-gated ion channels found in the membrane of excitable cells (e.g., muscle, glial cells, neurons, etc.) with a permeability to the calcium ion Ca2+. These channels are slightly permeable to sodium ions, so they are also called Ca2+–Na+ channels, but their permeability to calcium is about 1000-fold greater than to sodium under normal physiological conditions.
Sir Michael John Berridge (22 October 1938 - 13 February 2020) was a British physiologist and biochemist. He was known for his work on cell signaling, in particular the discovery that inositol trisphosphate acts as a second messenger, linking events at the plasma membrane with the release of calcium ions (Ca2+) within the cell.
Richard Henderson is a British molecular biologist and biophysicist and pioneer in the field of electron microscopy of biological molecules. Henderson shared the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2017 with Jacques Dubochet and Joachim Frank."Thanks to his work, we can look at individual atoms of living nature, thanks to cryo-electron microscopes we can see details without destroying samples, and for this he won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry."
Calcium-activated potassium channels are potassium channels gated by calcium, or that are structurally or phylogenetically related to calcium gated channels. They were first discovered in 1958 by Gardos who saw that calcium levels inside of a cell could affect the permeability of potassium through that cell membrane. Then in 1970, Meech was the first to observe that intracellular calcium could trigger potassium currents. In humans they are divided into three subtypes: large conductance or BK channels, which have very high conductance which range from 100 to 300 pS, intermediate conductance or IK channels, with intermediate conductance ranging from 25 to 100 pS, and small conductance or SK channels with small conductances from 2-25 pS.
Dame Frances Mary Ashcroft is a British ion channel physiologist. She is Royal Society GlaxoSmithKline Research Professor at the University Laboratory of Physiology at the University of Oxford. She is a fellow of Trinity College, Oxford, and is a director of the Oxford Centre for Gene Function. Her research group has an international reputation for work on insulin secretion, type II diabetes and neonatal diabetes. Her work with Andrew Hattersley has helped enable children born with diabetes to switch from insulin injections to tablet therapy.
N-type calcium channels also called Cav2.2 channels are voltage gated calcium channels that are localized primarily on the nerve terminals and dendrites as well as neuroendocrine cells. The calcium N-channel consists of several subunits: the primary subunit α1B and the auxiliary subunits α2δ and β. The α1B subunit forms the pore through which the calcium enters and helps to determine most of the channel's properties. These channels play an important role in the neurotransmission during development. In the adult nervous system, N-type calcium channels are critically involved in the release of neurotransmitters, and in pain pathways. N-type calcium channels are the target of ziconotide, the drug prescribed to relieve intractable cancer pain. There are many known N-type calcium channel blockers that function to inhibit channel activity, although the most notable blockers are ω-conotoxins.
The L-type calcium channel is part of the high-voltage activated family of voltage-dependent calcium channel. "L" stands for long-lasting referring to the length of activation. This channel has four isoforms: Cav1.1, Cav1.2, Cav1.3, and Cav1.4.
Dame Carol Vivien Robinson, is a British chemist and former president of the Royal Society of Chemistry (2018–2020). She was a Royal Society Research Professor and is the Dr Lee's Professor of Physical and Theoretical Chemistry, and a professorial fellow at Exeter College, University of Oxford. She is the first director of the Kavli Institution for Nanoscience Discovery, University of Oxford, and she was previously professor of mass spectrometry at the chemistry department of the University of Cambridge.
Jonathan Felix Ashmore is a British physicist and Bernard Katz Professor of Biophysics at University College London.
Stuart Graham Cull-Candy is a British neuroscientist. He holds the Gaddum Chair of Pharmacology and a personal Chair in Neuroscience at University College London. He is also a member of the Faculty of 1000 and held a Royal Society - Wolfson Research position.
Rajesh Vasantlal Thakker is May Professor of Medicine in the Nuffield Department of Clinical Medicine at the University of Oxford and a fellow of Somerville College, Oxford. Thakker is also a Consultant physician at the Churchill Hospital and the John Radcliffe Hospital, Principal investigator (PI) at the Oxford Centre for Diabetes, Endocrinology and Metabolism (OCDEM) and was Chairman of the NIHR/MRC Efficacy and Mechanism Evaluation (EME) Board until Spring 2016.
Sir Hugh Reginald Brentnall Pelham, is a cell biologist who has contributed to our understanding of the body's response to rises in temperature through the synthesis of heat shock proteins. He served as director of the Medical Research Council (MRC) Laboratory of Molecular Biology (LMB) between 2006 and 2018.
Maria Fitzgerald is a professor in the Department of Neuroscience at University College London.
Antony Giuseppe Galione is a British pharmacologist. He is a professor and Wellcome Trust senior investigator in the Department of Pharmacology at the University of Oxford.
David Lodge is a research fellow in the Department of Physiology and Pharmacology at the University of Bristol.
Dimitri Michael Kullmann is a professor of neurology at the UCL Institute of Neurology, University College London (UCL), and leads the synaptopathies initiative funded by the Wellcome Trust. Kullmann is a member of the Queen Square Institute of Neurology Department of Clinical and Experimental Epilepsy and a consultant neurologist at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery.
Anant B. Parekh is professor of Physiology at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of Merton College, Oxford.
Fiona Hamilton Marshall is a British pharmacologist, founder and Senior Vice President of Discovery, Preclinical & Translational Medicine at Merck & Co. She will become the next president of the Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research. She previously served as Chief Scientific Officer at Heptares Therapeutic, where she was Vice President of the Japanese biopharmaceutical company Sosei. She was elected Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences in 2016 and the Royal Society in 2021.
Arthur Henry Weston is emeritus professor at the University of Manchester, where he was previously Leech Professor of Pharmacology from 1989-2011.
