In a significant development on the front of treatment of cancer treatment researchers have found out an important step in healthy tissue formation - signals that cause proteins to form the glue that binds cells into tissues. But this glue can also cause cancers and inflammation if disrupted.
"Many of the proteins in this network have been implicated in cancer, meaning this discovery will provide valuable insights into how healthy tissues are disturbed in disease," Alpha Yap, professor at the University of Queensland's Institute for Molecular Bioscience (IMB) has been quoted as saying.
"Cells are the basic building blocks of our body. Healthy tissues require their component cells to recognise and adhere to one another," Yap, lead author of the team that discovered the signals prompting proteins to build the glue has been quoted as saying, the journal Nature Cell Biology reports.
"This adhesion is achieved through specialized bundles of proteins whose formation is promoted by a signaling protein called Rho. You can think of this signal like the conductor of an orchestra, making sure that all the players work together," a Queensland statement has quoted Yap as saying.
Yap and his co-authors Aparna Ratheesh and Guillermo Gomez studied Rho and identified a network of proteins that ensure Rho is activated at the correct time. The discovery follows the Yap's 2010 and 2011 discoveries of how such proteins may unstick inappropriately.
--With Inputs from IANS
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