Waseda Institute for Advanced Study, Waseda University, Tokyo 162-8480, Japan.
Department of Molecular Oncology, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University, Kyoto 606-8501, Japan.
Curr Opin Genet Dev. 2022 Feb;72:15-21. doi: 10.1016/j.gde.2021.09.006. Epub 2021 Oct 9.
Cell competition is a process by which cells with different properties compete with each other for survival and space, and consequently suboptimal/abnormal cells are often eliminated from, in particular, epithelial tissues. In the last few years, cell competition studies have been developing at an explosive speed, and the molecular mechanisms of cell competition have been considerably revealed. For instance, upon cell competition, loser cells are eliminated from tissues via a variety of loser phenotypes, including apoptosis, cell differentiation, and cell death-independent extrusion. In addition, upstream regulatory mechanisms for the induction of these phenotypes have been elucidated. Furthermore, it has become evident that cell competition is involved in various physiological and pathological processes and thus is a crucial and indispensable homeostatic machinery that is required for embryonic development and prevention of diseases and ageing. Moreover, cell competition now has a profound impact on other research fields such as regenerative medicine. In this review, we will summarize the development of these recent studies, especially focusing on cell competition in vertebrates.
细胞竞争是一种细胞间通过竞争生存空间和资源从而使具有不同特性的细胞相互竞争的过程，因此，处于劣势/异常的细胞通常会从特别是上皮组织中被淘汰。在过去的几年中，细胞竞争的研究发展迅速，细胞竞争的分子机制也得到了充分揭示。例如，在细胞竞争中，劣势细胞通过多种劣势表型（包括细胞凋亡、细胞分化和非依赖于细胞死亡的挤出）从组织中被清除。此外，诱导这些表型的上游调控机制也已经阐明。此外，越来越明显的是，细胞竞争参与了各种生理和病理过程，因此是胚胎发育、预防疾病和衰老所必需的关键和不可或缺的动态平衡机制。此外，细胞竞争现在对其他研究领域如再生医学产生了深远的影响。在这篇综述中，我们将总结这些最新研究的进展，特别是聚焦于脊椎动物中的细胞竞争。
