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First published online March 9, 2007

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A time to die

Programmed cell death (PCD) is an important developmental process, but how do cells know when it is time to die? Shai Shaham and co-workers now reveal the role that the transcription factor PAL-1 and the caspase CED-3 play in C. elegans tail-spike cell death (p.1357). Cell death in other C. elegans cells occurs via the EGL-1-mediated inhibition of CED-9, a BCL-2 protein, which triggers the release of the caspase activator CED-4 to cause CED-3 activation and cell death. The researchers show that PAL-1, independently of CED-9 activity, binds to the ced-3 promoter to cause its transcriptional induction. This induction immediately precedes cell death, indicating that ced-3 transcription is the temporal cue for PCD initiation. In pal-1 mutant worms, ced-3 is not upregulated and tail-spike PCD is prevented. Because the mammalian homologue of PAL-1 is Cdx2, which, when mutated, can cause intestinal tumours, the authors propose that by modulating Cdx2 expression, the overproliferation that is associated with intestinal cancers could be targeted.

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Related articles in Development:

Timing of the onset of a developmental cell death is controlled by transcriptional induction of the C. elegans ced-3 caspase-encoding gene

Carine W. Maurer, Michael Chiorazzi, and Shai Shaham
Development 2007 134: 1357-1368. [Abstract] [Full Text]  

This Article Full Text (PDF) Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Related articles in Development Similar articles in this journal Alert me to new issues of the journal Download to citation manager Citing Articles Citing Articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Search for Related Content Social Bookmarking                         What's this?