A disintegrin and metalloproteinase 10 (ADAM10) is a type I transmembrane glycoprotein responsible for the ectodomain shedding of a number of proteins implicated in the pathogenesis of diseases ranging from cancer to Alzheimer Disease. ADAM10 is synthesized in an inactive form, which is proteolytically activated during its forward transport along the secretory pathway and at the plasma membrane. Therefore, modulation of its trafficking could provide a mechanism to finely tune its shedding activity. Here we report the identification of an endoplasmic reticulum (ER) retention motif within the ADAM10 intracellular C-terminal tail. Sequential deletion/mutagenesis analyses showed that an arginine-rich ( 723 RRR) sequence was responsible for the retention of ADAM10 in the ER and its inefficient surface trafficking. Mutating the second arginine to alanine was sufficient to allow ER exit and surface expression in both heterologous cells and hippocampal neurons. As synapse-associated protein 97 (SAP97) binds ADAM10 at its cytoplasmic tail and facilitates forward ADAM10 trafficking in neurons, we tested whether SAP97 could modulate ER export. However, neither expression nor Ser-39 phosphorylation of SAP97 in heterologous cells or hippocampal neurons were sufficient to allow the ER exit of ADAM10, suggesting that other signaling pathways or alternative binding partners are responsible for ADAM10 ER exit. Together, these results identify a novel mechanism regulating the intracellular trafficking and membrane delivery of ADAM10.A disintegrin and metalloproteinase 10 (ADAM10) 2 belongs to a large family of membrane-anchored metalloproteases, which are known as the ADAM protein family. ADAMs mediate the proteolytic cleavage of transmembrane proteins in their juxtamembrane region, causing their shedding, i.e. the release of their extracellular domain in a soluble form. In addition, through the intracellularly retained stubs, ADAMs can initiate the activation of intracellular signaling cascades. Because of their metalloprotease, integrin binding, cell adhesion, and signaling functions, ADAMs are well positioned to coordinate cellular processes that are required for neural development, plasticity, and repair (1-3).ADAM10 works as a sheddase for a large number of transmembrane proteins involved in a variety of biological functions, and has been implicated in the pathogenesis of diseases ranging from cancer to Alzheimer Disease (AD) (4, 5). Because of these links, much effort is currently directed toward developing tools which modulate ADAM10 activity and can be used to target these pathologies.ADAM10 is a multidomain transmembrane glycoprotein which is expressed ubiquitously (6). It contains an N-terminal signal sequence followed by a prodomain, a metalloprotease domain, a disintegrin domain, a cysteine-rich region, an EGFlike repeat, a transmembrane domain and a SH3-binding cytoplasmic tail (7). ADAM10 is synthesized in an inactive form that carries a proprotein convertase (PC) recognition sequence between the prodomain and the c...