: Microbiology Articles
Review: A complex barcode underlies the heterogeneous response of p53 to stressThe tumour suppressor p53 is activated following stress and initiates a heterogeneous response in a cell-, tissue- and stress-dependent manner. This heterogeneity is reflected in the different physiological outcomes that follow p53 activation. One mechanism that may contribute to this variability is the promoter selectivity |
Review: Conserved functions of the pRB and E2F familiesProteins that are related to the retinoblastoma tumour suppressor pRB and the E2F transcription factor are conserved in many species of plants and animals. The mammalian orthologues of pRB and E2F are best known for their roles in cell proliferation, but it has become clear |
Review: Mammalian Rho GTPases: new insights into their functions from in vivo studiesRho GTPases are key regulators of cytoskeletal dynamics and affect many cellular processes, including cell polarity, migration, vesicle trafficking and cytokinesis. These proteins are conserved from plants and yeast to mammals, and function by interacting with and stimulating various downstream targets, including actin nucleators, protein |
Progress: Endogenous small interfering RNAs in animalsUntil recently, only nematodes among animals had a well-defined endogenous small interfering RNA (endo-siRNA) pathway. This has changed dramatically with the recent discovery of diverse intramolecular and intermolecular substrates that generate endo-siRNAs in Drosophila melanogaster and mice. These findings suggest broad and possibly conserved |
Review: Diversity of degradation signals in the ubiquitin–proteasome systemThe ubiquitin–proteasome system degrades an enormous variety of proteins that contain specific degradation signals, or 'degrons'. Besides the degradation of regulatory proteins, almost every protein suffers from sporadic biosynthetic errors or misfolding. Such aberrant proteins can be recognized and rapidly degraded by cells. Structural and |
Perspective: The promise of human induced pluripotent stem cells for research and therapyInduced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells are human somatic cells that have been reprogrammed to a pluripotent state. There are several hurdles to be overcome before iPS cells can be considered as a potential patient-specific cell therapy, and it will be crucial to characterize the developmental |
Perspective: Blebs lead the way: how to migrate without lamellipodiaBlebs are spherical membrane protrusions that are produced by contractions of the actomyosin cortex. Blebs are often considered to be a hallmark of apoptosis; however, blebs are also frequently observed during cytokinesis and during migration in three-dimensional cultures and in vivo. For tumour cells |