title: Role of p53 in Cell Death and Human Cancers.
abstract: p53 is a nuclear transcription factor with a pro-apoptotic function. Since over 50% of human cancers carry loss of function mutations in p53 gene, p53 has been considered to be one of the classical type tumor suppressors. Mutant p53 acts as the dominant-negative inhibitor toward wild-type p53. Indeed, mutant p53 has an oncogenic potential. In some cases, malignant cancer cells bearing p53 mutations display a chemo-resistant phenotype. In response to a variety of cellular stresses such as DNA damage, p53 is induced to accumulate in cell nucleus to exert its pro-apoptotic function. Activated p53 promotes cell cycle arrest to allow DNA repair and/or apoptosis to prevent the propagation of cells with serious DNA damage through the transactivation of its target genes implicated in the induction of cell cycle arrest and/or apoptosis. Thus, the DNA-binding activity of p53 is tightly linked to its tumor suppressive function. In the present review article, we describe the regulatory mechanisms of p53 and also p53-mediated therapeutic strategies to cure malignant cancers.
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Anti-tumor Research, Chiba Cancer Center Research Institute, 666-2 Nitona, Chuoh-ku, Chiba 260-8717, Japan. akiranak@chiba-cc.jp.
authors.forename: Toshinori
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Ozaki
authors.forename: Akira
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Nakagawara