...Georgia Bateman; Benjamin Hill; Ryan Knight; Dave Boucher Innate immune responses are tightly regulated by various pathways to control infections and maintain homeostasis. One of these pathways, the inflammasome pathway, activates a family of cysteine proteases called inflammatory caspases...

... activity is also shown to have an important role in determining cell fate, with both pro- and anti-apoptotic roles. Caspase 3-, 6- and 8-like activities are detected upon stimulation of yeast PCD, but not all of this activity is associated with Mca1, implicating other proteases with caspase-like activity...

... in endosomal trafficking, the genuine function of the protein in this process remains unclear. We have demonstrated recently that Alix and ALG-2 form in the presence of calcium, a complex with apical caspases and with the endocytosed death receptor TNFR1 (tumour necrosis factor α receptor 1), thus suggesting...

...Susan E. Logue; Seamus J. Martin Apoptosis, a highly controlled mode of cell death, is utilized to eliminate superfluous, aged, injured or infected cells from the body. Caspases, a family of aspartic acid-specific proteases, are the major effectors of apoptosis. To curtail their activity, caspases...

... are already well characterized. Caspases traditionally held the predominant role as prime mediators of execution. However, latterly, evidence has accumulated that non-caspases, including calpains, cathepsins, granzymes and the proteasome have roles in mediating and promoting cell death. Increasingly, research...

...-2 and caspase gene families. In this review, evidence for these pathways from experimental seizure modelling and clinical material from patients with intractable temporal lobe epilepsy is examined. Seizures cause mitochondrial dysfunction and activate intrinsic pathway components including pro...

... focuses on the emerging role of Bid as an integrating key regulator of the intrinsic death pathway that amplifies caspase-dependent and caspase-independent execution of neuronal apoptosis. Therefore pharmacological inhibition of Bid provides a promising therapeutic strategy in neurological diseases where...

... and caspase cascade. Energy failure and/or calcium overloading of mitochondria may trigger this sequence of events. We called this form of necrosis ‘programmed necrosis’. We discuss in this paper the contribution of another mitochondrial death factor, apoptosis-inducing factor. © 2006 The Biochemical...

... in apoptosis, where not only is it a target for caspases, but may also serve as an activator of these proteases to amplify the apoptotic signalling pathway. This paper reviews the investigations that have led to our current understanding of the mechanisms by which Mst1 may be activated and thereby contribute...

... cytokines have been shown to inhibit apoptosis through stabilization of the mitochondria and inhibition of the caspase cascade. To date, how these processes are inhibited remains the central question. We hypothesize that the decision for the delay in neutrophil apoptosis is made through signals delivered...

... with disease relevance are candidates for therapeutic intervention, namely caspase-mediated apoptosis, blood coagulation, the matrix metalloproteinase cascade and the complement cascade. Understanding the various steps involved in the functioning of a cascade is key to deciding possible points of intervention...

...E. M. Creagh; S. J. Martin Apoptosis is co-ordinated by a family of cysteine proteases, the caspases, that dismantle the cell by targeting a panoply of proteins for limited proteolysis. The mammalian caspase family contains 14 members, a subset of which participates in apoptosis, with the remainder...