Signal Transduction In Mast Cells

肥大细胞通过释放一系列介质在许多炎症和免疫反应中发挥重要作用。我们研究的目的是了解导致这些分子释放的细胞内信号转导途径。在先前的研究中，我们观察到蛋白酪氨酸磷酸化是FceRI诱导的脱粒的早期和关键信号。蛋白酪氨酸激酶Syk被发现是酪氨酸磷酸化和激活后，受体聚集。Syk也被证明是必不可少的受体诱导的炎症介质的释放。最近的研究表明Syk的连接区在调节其功能方面起着重要作用。研究还通过几种机制定义了细胞中信号传导下调的机制，包括被激活的蛋白质的降解以及调节和信号传导分子的相互作用。

Mast cells play an important role in many inflammatory and immunological reactions by releasing an array of mediators. The goal of our studies is to understand the intracellular signal transduction pathways that lead to the release of these molecules. In previous studies we observed that protein tyrosine phosphorylation is an early and critical signal for FceRI induced degranulation. The protein tyrosine kinase Syk was found to be tyrosine phosphorylated and activated after receptor aggregation. Syk was also shown to be essential for the receptor-induced release of inflammatory mediators. Recent studies demonstrated that the linker region of Syk plays an important role in regulating its function. Studies also defined the mechanisms for the down regulation of signaling in cells by several mechanisms including the degradation of proteins that are activated and by interaction of regulatory and signaling molecules.