How intracellular signaling regulates growth factor production
Friday, July 10, 2015 - 07:40
in Biology & Nature
Cancer cells need life-essential molecules to proliferate. These so-called growth factors are activated by ectodomain shedding of precursor proteins on the outside of the plasma membrane, mainly carried out by three human cleavage enzymes. A pharmaceutical blocking of these enzymes could hinder cancer from growing but would also inhibit other life-essential processes. Now, researchers from German Leibniz Institute for Age Research (FLI) and Harvard University, US, showed that the factor-precursor-producing cells themselves determine if and when cleavage may occur. This is decided by intracellular signaling. Interfering with defined signaling in cells producing cancer growth factors could be developed into a new way of cancer treatment.