Calcium in Physiological and Pathological Cell Function

Abstract

Calcium ions play a major role in the regulation of cell functions. Minor alterations of the cellular calcium ion homeostasis lead to major functional aberrations. Alterations of the calcium homeostasis occur under conditions of hypoxia, the major cause being an extracellular increase of potassium ions which gate voltage-dependent calcium entry. A hypothesis is forewarded which tries to find a link between parenchymatous and vascular reactions to hypoxia and which offers an explanation for the spread of hypoxic damage to neighboring normoxic cells.