Deficiency of Pro-apoptotic Hrk Attenuates Programmed Cell Death in the Developing Murine Nervous System but Does Not Affect Bcl-x Deficiency-Induced Neuron Apoptosis

gamma-Sarcoglycan deficiency increases cell contractility, apoptosis and MAPK pathway activation but does not affect adhesion.

The functions of gamma-sarcoglycan (gammaSG) in normal myotubes are largely unknown, however gammaSG is known to assemble into a key membrane complex with dystroglycan and its deficiency is one known cause of limb-girdle muscular dystrophy. Previous findings of apoptosis from gammaSG-deficient mice are extended here to cell culture where apoptosis is seen to increase more than tenfold in gammaS...

Programmed Cell Death in the Developing Nervous System

Virtually all cell populations in the vertebrate nervous system undergo massive "naturally-occurring" or "programmed" cell death (PCD) early in development. Initially neurons and glia are overproduced followed by the demise of approximately one-half of the original cell population. In this review we highlight current hypotheses regarding how large-scale PCD contributes to the construction of th...

Transmigration but Attenuates Polymorphonuclear Neutrophil CD47 Deficiency Does Not Impede

Epistatic and independent functions of caspase-3 and Bcl-X(L) in developmental programmed cell death.

The number of neurons in the mammalian brain is determined by a balance between cell proliferation and programmed cell death. Recent studies indicated that Bcl-X(L) prevents, whereas Caspase-3 mediates, cell death in the developing nervous system, but whether Bcl-X(L) directly blocks the apoptotic function of Caspase-3 in vivo is not known. To examine this question, we generated bcl-x/caspase-3...

Why does the central nervous system not regenerate after injury?

A major problem for neuroscientists and clinicians is why the central nervous system shows ineffective regeneration after injury. Injured peripheral nerve fibers reform their connections, whereas those in injured spinal cord never re-grow. Insights into the mechanisms for repair and restoration of function after spinal cord injury have been obtained by experiments showing that injured nerve cel...