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Is the Rac GTPase‐activating toxin CNF1 a smart hijacker of host cell fate?
Author(s) -
Malorni Walter,
Fiorentini Carla
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
the faseb journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.709
H-Index - 277
eISSN - 1530-6860
pISSN - 0892-6638
DOI - 10.1096/fj.05-4706hyp
Subject(s) - mitosis , mitotic catastrophe , microbiology and biotechnology , toxin , apoptosis , programmed cell death , biology , gtpase , cell , genetics
The term mitotic catastrophe (MC) was coined to describe the mammalian cell death caused by aberrant mitosis. MC occurs with features that are fundamentally different from those typifying other forms of cell death, including apoptosis. We report here for the first time that the Rac‐activating toxin CNF1 interferes with the occurrence of MC and leads to aneuploidy and multinucleation. This seems to be in line with the anti‐apoptotic activity of the toxin and consistent with the hypothesis that points at CNF1 as a toxin bearing a carcinogenic potential. ‐Malorni, W., Fiorentini, C. Is the Rac GTPase‐activating toxin CNF1 a smart hijacker of host cell fate? FASEB J. 20, 606–609 (2006)