Scheid Signalling Lab @ York University

Very interesting article in Nature describing how clonal evoluation of cancer cells involves evading the localized, restrictive environment. This study is important because it shows that other, potentially quiescent mutations to oncogenes could then become dominant once the cell translocates from its microenvironment.

Leung CT, Brugge JS. Nature. 2012 Feb 8;482(7385):410-3. Department of Cell Biology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts 02115, USA.

A recent paper by Worster and colleagues have provided some clues as to why PKB/Akt-dependent proliferation requires ERK activity, in this weeks edition of Science Signaling. See the Editors comments here with a link to the full citation.

D. T. Worster, T. Schmelzle, N. L. Solimini, E. S. Lightcap, B. Millard, G. B. Mills, J. S. Brugge, J. G. Albeck, Akt and ERK Control the Proliferative Response of Mammary Epithelial Cells to the Growth Factors IGF-1 and EGF Through the Cell Cycle Inhibitor p57^Kip2. Sci. Signal. 5, ra19 (2012).