Wang Jin-Yuan, Luo Zhen-Ge
Institute of Neuroscience, State Key Laboratory of Neuroscience, Shanghai Institutes for Biological Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai, 200031, China.
Neurosci Bull. 2014 Aug;30(4):667-70. doi: 10.1007/s12264-014-1454-4. Epub 2014 Jul 15.
Caspases, a family of cysteine proteases, mediate programmed cell death during early neural development and neurodegeneration, as well as following neurotoxic insults. Notably, accumulating lines of evidence have shown non-apoptotic roles of caspases in the structural and functional plasticity of neuronal circuits under physiological conditions, such as growth-cone dynamics and axonal/dendritic pruning, as well as neuronal excitability and plasticity. Here, we summarize recent progress on the roles of caspases in synaptic refinement.
半胱天冬酶是一类半胱氨酸蛋白酶,在神经发育早期、神经退行性变过程中以及遭受神经毒性损伤后介导程序性细胞死亡。值得注意的是,越来越多的证据表明,在生理条件下,半胱天冬酶在神经回路的结构和功能可塑性中具有非凋亡作用,如生长锥动力学和轴突/树突修剪,以及神经元兴奋性和可塑性。在此,我们总结了半胱天冬酶在突触精细化中作用的最新进展。