Mechanism of Action
Further information: Notch proteinThe Notch protein spans the cell membrane, with part of it inside and part outside. Ligand proteins binding to the extracellular domain induce proteolytic cleavage and release of the intracellular domain, which enters the cell nucleus to modify gene expression.
Because most ligands are also transmembrane proteins, the receptor is normally triggered only from direct cell-to-cell contact. In this way, groups of cells can organise themselves, such that, if one cell expresses a given trait, this may be switched off in neighbour cells by the intercellular notch signal. In this way, groups of cells influence one another to make large structures. Thus, lateral inhibition mechanisms are key to Notch signaling.
The notch cascade consists of notch and notch ligands, as well as intracellular proteins transmitting the notch signal to the cell's nucleus. The Notch/Lin-12/Glp-1 receptor family was found to be involved in the specification of cell fates during development in Drosophila and C. elegans.
Read more about this topic: Notch Signaling Pathway
Famous quotes containing the words mechanism of, mechanism and/or action:
“Life is an offensive, directed against the repetitious mechanism of the Universe.”
—Alfred North Whitehead (1861–1947)
“The two elements the traveler first captures in the big city are extrahuman architecture and furious rhythm. Geometry and anguish. At first glance, the rhythm may be confused with gaiety, but when you look more closely at the mechanism of social life and the painful slavery of both men and machines, you see that it is nothing but a kind of typical, empty anguish that makes even crime and gangs forgivable means of escape.”
—Federico García Lorca (1898–1936)
“A tragedy is a representation of an action that is whole and complete and of a certain magnitude.... A whole is what has a beginning and middle and end.”
—Aristotle (384–323 B.C.)