Focus on mechanotransduction
Nature Reviews Molecular and Cell Biology presents a special Focus on mechanotransduction — on a range of topics from how cells sense mechanical forces in different tissues to how these mechanical forces are transduced into biochemical signals — in development, normal physiology and disease. Cells sense their physical three-dimensional environment — properties of the extracellular matrix, neighbouring cells and physical stress — by translating mechanical forces and deformations into biochemical signals. In turn, these signals can adjust cellular and extracellular structure. This mechanosensitive feedback modulates cellular functions as diverse as proliferation, differentiation, migration and apoptosis, and is crucial for organ development and homeostasis. Any molecular defect that interrupts or alters this chain of mechanical sensing and subsequent cell signalling events could perturb the normal cellular function and potentially lead to diverse diseases such as loss of hearing, cardiovascular disease, muscular dystrophy and cancer.
The Focus is free to access for the month of January 2009.
See also Milestones in Cytoskeleton, and request a free print copy here.
