CGC Bibliography Paper 5069

Apoptosis: Mostly dead.

Green DR, Beere HM

Medline:

1149252

Citation:

Nature 412: 133-135 2001

Type:

REVIEW

Genes:

ced-3 ced-4 ced-9 egl-1

Abstract:

In all animals, the process of programmed cell suicide (apoptosis) is coordinated by enzymes known as caspases, which cut up key substrates in the cell. The dying cell is then neatly packaged, engulfed by neighbouring "phagocytic" cells, and cleared from the body without fanfare, leaving no evidence of the catastrophic events that preceded. It has always been assumed that there is a "point of no return" in this death cascade - at or shortly before the time at which caspases are activated - beyond which the process of cell execution proceeds inexorably. This view is challenged by Reddien et al. and Hoeppner et al. on pages 198 and 202 of this issue. It seems that cells in which caspases have been activated can in fact progress through a state of being "mostly dead", a stage that physically resembles the early phase of apoptosis but from