A vacuole membrane-associated calcium-binding protein with an apparent mass of 45 kD was purified from celery (Apium graveolens). This protein, VCaB45, is enriched in highly vacuolate tissues and is located within the lumen of vacuoles. Antigenically related proteins are present in many dicotyledonous plants. VCaB45 contains significant amino acid identity with the dehydrin family signature motif, is antigenically related to dehydrins, and has a variety of biochemical properties similar to dehydrins. VCaB45 migrates anomalously in sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis having an apparent molecular mass of 45 kD. The true mass as determined by matrix-assisted laser-desorption ionization time of flight was 16.45 kD. VCaB45 has two characteristic dissociation constants for calcium of 0.22 Ϯ 0.142 mm and 0.64 Ϯ 0.08 mm, and has an estimated 24.7 Ϯ 11.7 calcium-binding sites per protein. The calcium-binding properties of VCaB45 are modulated by phosphorylation; the phosphorylated protein binds up to 100-fold more calcium than the dephosphorylated protein. VCaB45 is an "in vitro" substrate of casein kinase II (a ubiquitous eukaryotic kinase), the phosphorylation resulting in a partial activation of calcium-binding activity. The vacuole localization, calcium binding, and phosphorylation of VCaB45 suggest potential functions.The vacuole is a reservoir for calcium (Machlon, 1984) and consequently plays an important role in calcium homeostasis (Miller et al., 1990;Allen and Sanders, 1995;Sanders et al., 1999). Regulation of vacuole calcium levels is complex involving a variety of calcium channels and pumps (Sanders et al., 1999;Sze et al., 2000). Sustained elevated levels of cytosolic calcium can be toxic (Hepler and Wayne, 1985), so under normal conditions, cytosolic calcium levels increase only transiently. Proteinaceous calcium buffers may serve as homeostats to attenuate the signal transduction system. Well-characterized protein calcium buffers include calreticulin and calsequestrin (Ostwald and MacLennon, 1974;Campbell et al., 1983b). Homologs of calsequestrin (Krause et al., 1989;Xing et al., 1994), calreticulin (Chen et al., 1994;Napier et al., 1995;Nelson et al., 1997), and calnexin (Li et al., 1998) have been identified in plants. These calcium-binding proteins can bind on the order of 20 to 50 calcium ions with both high-(1-3 sites per protein) and low-(20-50 sites per protein) affinity sites. The levels of calcium binding proteins may have a significant impact on signaling processes and may regulate second messenger transmission (Camacho and Lechleiter, 1995;Mery et al., 1996;Coppolino et al., 1997). In an alternative role, calcium-dependent interactions of calnexin and calreticulin have been characterized with a variety of proteins (Nigam et al., 1994;Peterson et al., 1995) and both are implicated in the promotion of correct protein folding (Hebert et al., 1996). These latter activities clearly suggest a molecular chaperone role. Recently, a high-capacity, low-affinity calcium-binding protei...