What is survivin in cancer?

Survivin, an inhibitor of apoptosis protein, is highly expressed in most cancers and associated with chemotherapy resistance, increased tumor recurrence, and shorter patient survival, making antisurvivin therapy an attractive cancer treatment strategy.

How does Survivin inhibit apoptosis?

Survivin is the smallest member of the inhibitor of apoptosis protein family, which has key roles in regulating cell division and inhibiting apoptosis by blocking caspase activation. Survivin is highly expressed in most human cancers, such as lung, pancreatic and breast cancers, relative to normal tissues.

What is survivin gene?

Survivin is the smallest member of the Inhibitor of apoptosis (IAP) family of proteins, involved in inhibition of apoptosis and regulation of cell cycle. These functional attributes make Survivin a unique protein exhibiting divergent functions i.e. regulating cell proliferation and cell death.

Why is apoptosis necessary?

Apoptosis removes cells during development. It also eliminates pre-cancerous and virus-infected cells, although “successful” cancer cells manage to escape apoptosis so they can continue dividing. Apoptosis maintains the balance of cells in the human body and is particularly important in the immune system.

How is caspase 3 activated?

Abstract. Caspase-3 is a cysteine–aspartic acid protease that cleaves cellular targets and executes cell death. Our current understanding is caspase-3 is activated by the cleavage of the interdomain linker and then subsequent cleavage of the N-terminal prodomain.

What is survivin promoter?

The survivin promoter also induced transgene expression of a mutant Bik in cancer cells, which suppressed the growth of cancer cells in vitro and in vivo. These results indicate that the survivin promoter is a cancer-specific promoter for various cancers and that it may be useful in cancer gene therapy.

What are the four main stages of apoptosis?

To illustrate these apoptosis events and how to detect them, Bio-Rad has created a pathway which divides apoptosis into four stages: induction, early phase, mid phase and late phase (Figure 1).

What is p53 p21 pathway?

p53/p21 Pathway involved in mediating cellular senescence of bone marrow-derived mesenchymal stem cells from systemic lupus erythematosus patients.

What is the relationship between p53 and p21?

Abstract. In many cell types, p53-mediated growth inhibition is dependent on induction of p21, which is an inhibitor of cyclin-dependent kinases that are required for cell cycle progression. Failure of mutant p53 proteins to transactivate p21 may lead to uncontrolled proliferation.