Volume 14 Issue 10, October 2013

The identification of the 'Q body' as a dynamic quality control structure for misfolded proteins.

TSC inhibits mTORC1 in response to oxidative stress in peroxisomes.

Gα subunits of G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs) transduce changes in intracellular pH to changes in GPCR signalling

The first chaperonin was discovered in plants in 1980.

The studies that implicated CIN and aneuploidy in ageing.

Lamin A upregulation in response to a tense extracellular environment may help to protect the nucleus.

It is possible to obtain totipotent iPS cellsin vivo as well as to increase in vitroreprogramming efficiency to almost 100%.

Proteasomal processing of Def1 allows it to target an RNA polymerase subunit for degradation during stress.

Disruption of the protein quality control system can lead to protein misfolding, inactivity and aggregation. New structural and biochemical insights into how disaggregases collaborate with co-chaperones and utilize ATP to untangle these aggregates are now being gained. This is clinically relevant, as aggregation is often linked to common neurodegenerative diseases.

Chaperones are heavy-duty molecular machines that assist nascent proteins to reach their native fold but also mediate unfolding and prevent the accumulation of toxic protein aggregates. There is an increasing structural understanding of how they might perform such large-scale rearrangements.

The addition or removal of poly(A) tails from the 3′ ends of eukaryotic RNAs is a key regulator of RNA stability and, consequently, of gene expression. Recent work has revealed that RNA turnover is also controlled by the addition of oligo(U) tails.

Structural and mechanistic studies have revealed common features of the way in which RNA and proteins are prepared for degradation by the exosome and proteasome, respectively. By extrapolating from what has been learnt about the proteasome, we may gain increased understanding of how its RNA counterpart, the exosome, is assembled and controlled.

Damage signalling in response to DNA double-strand breaks is under tight negative regulation. These control mechanisms, which include post-translational modifications and changes in chromatin structure, ensure that pathways are spatially and temporally regulated and that they become inactivated when repair is complete.

Nuclear factor-κB (NF-κB) signalling is tightly regulated through ubiquitylation and phosphorylation of its components. Integral to this post-translational regulation is the polyubiquitin-binding protein NF-κB essential modulator (NEMO), which controls the modification of numerous NF-κB signalling proteins, such as the canonical IκB kinase (IKKs) and IKK-related kinases.