Wounds quiet basal cells

Skin cells talk to each other through gap junctions, which allow the passage of ions and small signaling molecules such as cAMP and ATP. Junctions can be made more selective—allowing fewer or smaller molecules to pass through—by a serine phosphorylation on connexin43 (Cx43), the main structural protein of gap junctions in human skin.

This phosphorylation is now shown to occur in the basal layer of skin cells within 200 μm of a wound. In cultured skin cell monolayers, dye normally spread through the junctions across 25 cells, but wounding and the subsequent protein kinase C–dependent phosphorylation of Cx43 limited the dye's reach...