title: Kinase cascades regulating entry into apoptosis.
abstract: All cells are constantly exposed to conflicting environment cues that signal cell survival or cell death. Survival signals are delivered by autocrine or paracrine factors that actively suppress a default death pathway. In addition to survival factor withdrawal, cell death can be triggered by environmental stresses such as heat, UV light, and hyperosmolarity or by dedicated death receptors (e.g., FAS/APO-1 and tumor necrosis factor [TNF] receptors) that are counterparts of growth factor or survival receptors at the cell surface. One of the ways that cells integrate conflicting exogenous stimuli is by phosphorylation (or dephosphorylation) of cellular constituents by interacting cascades of serine/threonine and tyrosine protein kinases (and phosphatases). Survival factors (e.g., growth factors and mitogens) activate receptor tyrosine kinases and selected mitogen-activated, cyclin-dependent, lipid-activated, nucleic acid-dependent, and cyclic AMP-dependent kinases to promote cell survival and proliferation, whereas environmental stress (or death factors such as FAS/APO-1 ligand and TNF-alpha) activates different members of these kinase families to inhibit cell growth and, under some circumstances, promote apoptotic cell death. Because individual kinase cascades can interact with one another, they are able to integrate conflicting exogenous stimuli and provide a link between cell surface receptors and the biochemical pathways leading to cell proliferation or cell death.
authors.affiliation: Division of Tumor Immunology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, Massachusetts 02115, USA.
authors.forename: P
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Anderson
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000818:Animals; D017209:Apoptosis; D018844:Cyclin-Dependent Kinases / Q000378:metabolism; D006801:Humans; D010749:Phosphoprotein Phosphatases / Q000378:metabolism; D011494:Protein Kinases / Q000378:metabolism*; D017346:Protein Serine-Threonine Kinases / Q000378:metabolism; D011505:Protein-Tyrosine Kinases / Q000378:metabolism; D015398:Signal Transduction
chemical_list: D011494:Protein Kinases; D011505:Protein-Tyrosine Kinases; D017346:Protein Serine-Threonine Kinases; D018844:Cyclin-Dependent Kinases; D010749:Phosphoprotein Phosphatases