Dystroglycan in Skin and Cutaneous Cells: β-Subunit Is Shed from the Cell Surface

In skin, hemidesmosomal protein complexes attach the epidermis to the dermis and are critical for stable connection of the basal epithelial cell cytoskeleton with the basement membrane (BM). In muscle, a similar supramolecular aggregate, the dystrophin glycoprotein complex links the inside of muscle cells with the BM. A component of the muscle complex, dystroglycan (DG), also occurs in epithelia. In this study, we characterized the expression and biochemical properties of authentic and recombinant DG in human skin and cutaneous cells in vitro. We show that DG is present at the epidermal BM zone, and it is produced by both keratinocytes and fibroblasts in vitro. The biosynthetic precursor is…