Tautvydas Paskevicius

We previously showed that calnexin (Canx)‐deficient mice are desensitized to experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE) induction, a model that is frequently used to study inflammatory demyelinating diseases, due to increased resistance of the blood‐brain barrier to immune cell transmigration. We also discovered that Fabp5, an abundant cytopla...

Metastasis is the primary cause of cancer patient death and the elevation of SLC2A5 gene expression is often observed in metastatic cancer cells. Here we evaluated the importance of SLC2A5 in cancer cell motility by silencing its gene. We discovered that CRISPR/Cas9-mediated inactivation of the SLC2A5 gene inhibited cancer cell proliferation and mi...

Calnexin is a type I integral endoplasmic reticulum (ER) membrane protein with an N-terminal domain that resides in the lumen of the ER and a C-terminal domain that extends into the cytosol. Calnexin is commonly referred to as a molecular chaperone involved in the folding and quality control of membrane-associated and secreted proteins, a function...

The infiltration of immune cells into the central nervous system mediates the development of autoimmune neuroinflammatory diseases. We previously showed that the loss of either Fabp5 or calnexin causes resistance to the induction of experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE) in mice, an animal model of multiple sclerosis (MS). Here we show tha...

The endoplasmic reticulum (ER) plays a central role in cellular stress responses via mobilization of ER stress coping responses, such as the unfolded protein response (UPR). The inositol‐requiring 1α (IRE1α) is an ER stress sensor and component of the UPR. Muscle cells also have a well‐developed and highly subspecialized membrane network of smooth...

Calreticulin (CALR) is a highly conserved multifunctional chaperone protein primarily present in the endoplasmic reticulum, where it regulates Ca²⁺ homeostasis. Recently, CALR has gained special interest for its diverse functions outside the endoplasmic reticulum, including the cell surface and extracellular space. Although high-resolution structur...

Calsequestrin is among the most abundant proteins in muscle sarcoplasmic reticulum and displays a high capacity but a low affinity for Ca²⁺ binding. In mammals, calsequestrin is encoded by two genes, CASQ1 and CASQ2, which are expressed almost exclusively in skeletal and cardiac muscles, respectively. Phylogenetic analysis indicates that calsequest...

Cyclosporine, a widely used immunosuppressant in organ transplantation and in treatment of various autoimmune diseases, activates the unfolded protein response (UPR), an ER stress coping response. In this study we discovered a new and unanticipated cyclosporine-dependent signaling pathway, with cyclosporine triggering direct activation of the UPR....