Dystrophin constitutes 5% of membrane cytoskeleton in skeletal muscle

Dystrophin, which is absent in skeletal muscle of Duchenne muscular dystrophy patients, has not been considered to play a major structural role in the cell membrane of skeletal muscle because of its low abundance (approximately 0.002% of total muscle protein). Here, we have determined the relative abundance of dystrophin in a membrane cytoskeleton preparation and found that dystrophin constitutes approximately 5% of the total membrane cytoskeleton fraction of skeletal muscle sarcolemma. In addition, dystrophin can be removed from sarcolemma by alkaline treatment. Thus, our results have demonstrated that dystrophin is a major component of the subsarcolemmal cytoskeleton in skeletal muscle and suggest that dystrophin could play a major structural role in the cell membrane of skeletal muscle.