In voltage-dependent sodium channels there is some functional specialization of the four different S4 voltage sensors with regard to the gating process. Whereas the voltage sensors of domains 1 to 3 control activation gating, the movement of the voltage sensor of domain 4 (S4D4) is known to be tightly coupled to sodium channel inactivation, and there is some experimental evidence that S4D4 also participates in activation gating. To further explore its putative multifunctional role in the gating process, we changed the central part of S4D4 in rat brain IIA (rBIIA) sodium channels by the simultaneous replacement of the third (R1632), fourth (R1635) and fifth (R1638) arginine by histidine (mutation R3/4/5H). As a result, the time course of current decay observed in R3/4/5H was about three times slower, if compared to wild type (WT). On the other hand, the recovery, as well as the voltage dependence of fast inactivation, remained largely unaffected by the mutation. This suggests that at physiological pH (7.5) the effective charge of the voltage sensor was not significantly changed by the amino-acid substitutions. The well-known impact of site-3 toxin (ATX-II) on the inactivation was drastically reduced in R3/4/5H, without changing the toxin affinity of the channel. The activation kinetics of WT and R3/4/5H studied at low temperature (8 degrees C) were indistinguishable, while the inactivation time course of R3/4/5H was then clearly more slowed than in WT. These data suggest that the replacement of arginines by histidines in the central part of S4D4 clearly affects the movement of S4D4 without changing the activation kinetics.