title: The challenges of abundance: epithelial junctions and small GTPase signalling.
abstract: Small GTPases of the Ras superfamily play critical roles in epithelial biogenesis. Many key morphogenetic functions occur when small GTPases act at epithelial junctions, where they mediate an increasingly complex interplay between cell-cell adhesion molecules and fundamental cellular processes, such as cytoskeletal activity, polarity and trafficking. Important recent advances in this field include the role of additional members of the Ras superfamily in cell-cell contact stability and the capacity for polarity determinants to regulate small GTPase signalling. Interestingly, small GTPases may participate in the cross-talk between different adhesive receptors: in tissues classical cadherins can selectively regulate other junctions through cell signalling rather than through a global influence on cell-cell cohesion.
authors.affiliation: Cell and Molecular Biology Section, Division of Biomedical Sciences, Faculty of Life Sciences, Imperial College London, SW7 2AZ, London. v.braga@imperial.ac.uk
authors.forename: Vania Mm
authors.initials: VM
authors.lastname: Braga
authors.forename: Alpha S
authors.initials: AS
authors.lastname: Yap
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D015815:Cell Adhesion Molecules / Q000378:metabolism / Q000502:physiology; D016764:Cell Polarity / Q000502:physiology; D004789:Enzyme Activation; D004847:Epithelial Cells / Q000378:metabolism* / Q000502:physiology; D007365:Intercellular Junctions / Q000378:metabolism* / Q000502:physiology; D051379:Mice; D008954:Models, Biological; D020559:Monomeric GTP-Binding Proteins / Q000378:metabolism* / Q000502:physiology; D015398:Signal Transduction / Q000502:physiology*
chemical_list: D015815:Cell Adhesion Molecules; D020559:Monomeric GTP-Binding Proteins