Gap junctions in health and disease.

An international symposium was held on gap junctions in health and disease in Regensburg, Germany, gathering together a panel of international scientists who discussed normal functions of gap junctions and their contribution to a variety of human diseases. The emphasis was on strategies and models for a better understanding of gap junction-mediated cell-to-cell communication in a variety of tissues, including null mutations of gap junction genes in recombinant transgenic mice. The topics varied from the normal function of cardiac gap junctions and its contribution to cardiac dysfunction up to the recently discovered point mutations of a gap junction gene encoding the gap junction protein connexin32 in Charcot-Marie-Tooth syndrome of the X1 type. A perspective of the future development of gap junction research and its contribution to unravelling pathophysiological mechanisms of human diseases was given by M.V.L. Bennett.