␣-Sarcoglycan is a component of the sarcoglycan complex of dystrophin-associated proteins. Mutations of any of the sarcoglycan genes cause specific forms of muscular dystrophies, collectively termed sarcoglycanopathies. Importantly, a deficiency of any specific sarcoglycan affects the expression of the others. Thus, it appears that the lack of sarcoglycans deprives the muscle cell of an essential, yet unknown function. In the present study, we provide evidence for an ecto-ATPase activity of ␣-sarcoglycan. ␣-Sarcoglycan binds ATP in a Mg Dystrophin is a large cytoskeletal protein associated with a complex of integral and peripheral membrane proteins collectively termed DAPs.1 Dystrophin is a long filamentous protein comprising four distinct structural domains: the amino-terminal domain, which binds F-actin, the rod-like central domain; the cysteine-rich domain, which binds the cytoplasmic portion of -dystroglycan and syntrophins; and the carboxyl-terminal domain (1). The DAPs complex is composed of three subcomplexes: syntrophins, dystroglycans, and sarcoglycans (2, 3). Syntrophins are peripheral membrane proteins of unknown function that bind the carboxyl terminus of dystrophin (4, 5). Dystroglycans consist of two proteins derived from a common precursor protein: ␣-dystroglycan, a peripheral glycoprotein that binds extracellular matrix proteins like laminin-2 (merosin) and, in the neuromuscular junction, laminin-4 (agrin); and -dystroglycan, an intrinsic membrane protein that binds dystrophin at its cytoplasmic tail and ␣-dystroglycan at the opposite end (6, 7). Therefore, the dystroglycans represent the link between the subsarcolemmal actin cytoskeleton and the extracellular matrix through dystrophin. Five sarcoglycans have been described: ␣-sarcoglycan (adhalin, 50 kDa), -sarcoglycan (43 kDa), ␥-and ␦-sarcoglycans (35 kDa) (8 -10), and ⑀-sarcoglycan (11, 12). The function of the sarcoglycans remains unknown.Dystrophin is defective in Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) and Becker muscular dystrophy. In patients with DMD and in the mdx mouse, an animal model for DMD, all of the components of the DAPs are severely reduced at the sarcolemma (13, 14), even though they are almost normal at the neuromuscular junction (15).Mutations in the ␣-sarcoglycan gene, which is located on chromosome 17q21 (10), were demonstrated in limb girdle muscular dystrophy-2D (LGMD-2D), an autosomal recessive muscular dystrophy that affects both females and males (16,17). In LGMD-2D, -and ␥-sarcoglycan were also absent or greatly reduced, whereas dystrophin and the dystroglycan complex were preserved (18). Similar modifications were also found in the skeletal muscle of the cardiomyopatic hamster, an animal model of this disease (19). Recently, mutations in the genes that encode for -, ␥-, and ␦-sarcoglycan, located on chromosomes 4q12, 13q12, and 5q33-34, were discovered in LGMD-2E, -2C, and -2F, respectively (9,20,21). These mutations caused the absence not only of the respective protein product but also of the other three components...