N-terminal integrity governs heptamer assembly and maturation in a mosquito innexin hemichannel.

N-terminal integrity in the mosquito innexin AGAP001487 from Anopheles gambiae governs maturation into a fully symmetric heptameric hemichannel, with two-residue loss disrupting function.

• Why it matters: Insect innexins’ assembly and maturation mechanisms are unclear, limiting understanding of how nonchordate gap junction channels form defined oligomeric structures.
• What they did: Cryo-EM structures of AGAP001487 reconstituted in lipid nanodiscs were compared across wild type and N-terminal deletions, including a construct missing two or more residues.
• The result: Deleting two or more N-terminal residues yields disrupted rotational symmetry, extensive N-terminal disorder, pore collapse, altered pore–lipid interactions, and a minor hexameric particle population consistent with an assembly intermediate.

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