Congenital heart disease protein 5 associates with CASZ1 to maintain myocardial tissue integrity

Sojka et al. published in the journal Development their findings that the cardiac transcription factor CASTOR (CASZ1) directly interacts with contenital heart disease 5 protein (CHD5).

They show that the loss of CDH5 in Xenopus leads to compromised myocardial integrity and improper deposition of cellular basement membrane which leads to failure of hearts to undergo proper cell movements associated with cardiac formation.

CDH5 is nessessary for the transcription factor CASZ1 function and the direct interaction between these proteins is required for cardiac morphogenesis.

Reproduced/adapted with permission from The Company of Biologists Ltd | Congenital heart disease protein 5 associates with CASZ1 to maintain myocardial tissue integrity. Development (2014) 141, 3040-3049 doi:10.1242/dev.106518, copyright (2014).

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Slider image a composite of Figure 8 from Sojka et al. and an image of the Xenopus heart adapted from the imaging course at the National Xenopus Resource (NXR) 2014.