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Slimy catenins

In the 7 December Nature Grimson et al. report that, like metazoans, the slime mold Dictyostelium discoideum has a β-catenin involved both in signaling and in forming adherens junctions (Nature 2000, 408:727-731). The junctions form after the unicellular amoebae are starved and aggregate into a fruiting body, with junctions present only between cells at a constriction near the top of the stalk tube. In mutants lacking the β-catenin, most of the fruiting bodies collapse, and there is an additional signaling defect: a cell-autonomous failure to induce certain aspects of prespore gene expression. The existence of the Dictyostelium protein and a related protein in the plant Arabidopsis thaliana suggest that evolution of β-catenin may have been a prerequisite for all multicellular development.

References

  1. Nature, [http://www.nature.com/nature/]

  2. Functional interaction of beta-catenin with the transcription factor LEF-1.

  3. The molecular constituents of intercellular junctions.

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Wells, W. Slimy catenins. Genome Biol 1, spotlight-20001211-01 (2000). https://doi.org/10.1186/gb-spotlight-20001211-01

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1186/gb-spotlight-20001211-01

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