McCrea Pierre D, Gottardi Cara J
Department of Genetics, UT MD Anderson Cancer Center, Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences, University of Texas Health Science Center, Houston, Texas 77030, USA.
Department of Medicine, Department of Cellular and Molecular Biology, Feinberg School of Medicine, Northwestern University, Chicago, Illinois 60612, USA.
Nat Rev Mol Cell Biol. 2016 Jan;17(1):55-64. doi: 10.1038/nrm.2015.3. Epub 2015 Nov 18.
β-catenin is widely regarded as the primary transducer of canonical WNT signals to the nucleus. In most vertebrates, there are eight additional catenins that are structurally related to β-catenin, and three α-catenin genes encoding actin-binding proteins that are structurally related to vinculin. Although these catenins were initially identified in association with cadherins at cell-cell junctions, more recent evidence suggests that the majority of catenins also localize to the nucleus and regulate gene expression. Moreover, the number of catenins reported to be responsive to canonical WNT signals is increasing. Here, we posit that multiple catenins form a functional network in the nucleus, possibly engaging in conserved protein-protein interactions that are currently better characterized in the context of actin-based cell junctions.
β-连环蛋白被广泛认为是经典WNT信号向细胞核的主要转导分子。在大多数脊椎动物中，还有另外八种与β-连环蛋白结构相关的连环蛋白，以及三个编码与纽蛋白结构相关的肌动蛋白结合蛋白的α-连环蛋白基因。尽管这些连环蛋白最初是在细胞间连接处与钙黏着蛋白相关联时被鉴定出来的，但最近的证据表明，大多数连环蛋白也定位于细胞核并调节基因表达。此外，据报道对经典WNT信号有反应的连环蛋白数量正在增加。在这里，我们假定多种连环蛋白在细胞核中形成一个功能网络，可能参与目前在基于肌动蛋白的细胞连接处背景下得到更好表征的保守蛋白质-蛋白质相互作用。
