Cell death is, perhaps paradoxically, essential for life. This is particularly so for multicellular organisms, where cell death plays crucial roles in regulating embryonic development, tissue homeostasis, immune function, tumor suppression, and infection resistance. Much of what is known about cell death has been developed through studies in the last two decades, an era that has witnessed an ex...

In order to study the ultrastructural changes and characteristics associated with programmed cell death (PCD) in petals of Paeonia lactiflora during senescence, scanning electron microscopy transmission were used observe surface interior perianth slices P. ‘Zhong Sheng Fen’ flower at different blooming stages. Observations indicated that PCD parenchyma cells occurred an early flowering stage, e...

Cell death exists in many different forms. Some are accidental, but most of them have some kind of regulation and are called programmed cell death. Programmed cell death (PCD) is a very diverse and complex mechanism and must be tightly regulated. This study investigated PCD induced by DFNA5, a gene responsible for autosomal dominant hearing loss (HL) and a tumor suppressor gene (TSG) involved i...

The Pseudomonas syringae protein AvrPtoB is translocated into plant cells, where it inhibits immunity-associated programmed cell death (PCD). The structure of a C-terminal domain of AvrPtoB that is essential for anti-PCD activity reveals an unexpected homology to the U-box and RING-finger components of eukaryotic E3 ubiquitin ligases, and we show that AvrPtoB has ubiquitin ligase activity. Muta...

Self-incompatibility (SI) prevents inbreeding through specific recognition and rejection of incompatible pollen. In incompatible Papaver rhoeas pollen, SI triggers a Ca2+ signaling cascade, resulting in the inhibition of tip growth, actin depolymerization, and programmed cell death (PCD). We investigated whether actin dynamics were implicated in regulating PCD. Using the actin-stabilizing and d...

Programmed cell death (PCD) of epidermal cells that cover adventitious root primordia in deepwater rice (Oryza sativa) is induced by submergence. Early suicide of epidermal cells may prevent injury to the growing root that emerges under flooding conditions. Induction of PCD is dependent on ethylene signaling and is further promoted by gibberellin (GA). Ethylene and GA act in a synergistic manne...

programmed cell death is a highly regulated form of cell death, mostly distinguished by the activation of a family of cystein-aspartate proteases (caspases) that cleave various proteins resulting in morphological and biochemical changes characteristic of this form of cell death. several recent studies have addressed the role of programmed cell death in inflammatory and chronic pain states. casp...

The Inhibitor of apoptosis (IAP) antagonists Reaper (Rpr), Grim and Hid are central regulators of developmental apoptosis in Drosophila. Ectopic expression of each is sufficient to trigger apoptosis, and hid and rpr have been shown to be important for programmed cell death (PCD). To investigate the role for grim in PCD, a grim null mutant was generated. grim was not a key proapoptotic gene for ...

Programmed cell death (PCD) is a key phenomenon in the regulation of cell number in multicellular organisms. We have shown that reduction of endogenous transforming growth factor beta (TGF-beta) prevents apoptotic PCD of neurons in the developing peripheral and central nervous system, suggesting that TGF-beta is an important mediator of ontogenetic neuron death. Previous studies suggested that ...

There is increasing evidence that proteins normally involved in the cell cycle can regulate neuronal programmed cell death (PCD). However, it remains unknown whether cell cycle markers are expressed in normal, postmitotic, postmigratory neurons undergoing PCD in vivo. We have previously shown that natural cell death occurs postnatally in dopamine neurons of the substantia nigra pars compacta (S...