唯BH3域蛋白在肿瘤治疗中的研究进展

Research progress of BH3-only proteins in the treatment of cancers

唯BH3域蛋白作为Bcl-2蛋白家族的一大亚类,通过抑制Bcl-2抗凋亡蛋白和(或)激活Bcl-2促凋亡蛋白,在调节细胞凋亡的过程中起着极其重要的作用。许多癌症中编码唯BH3域蛋白的基因发生严重突变,而且在小鼠中敲除这些基因后可诱导肿瘤的发生,这提示唯BH3域蛋白可作为肿瘤抑制剂。唯BH3域模拟物正发展为新型小分子靶向抗癌药物,这可能有助于为肿瘤设计更好的治疗策略。

As part of the Bcl-2 proteins family, BH3-only proteins play an extremely important role in the regulation of apoptosis by inhibiting the activity of Bcl-2 anti-apoptotic proteins and(or) activating Bcl-2 pro-apoptotic proteins. Mutations crippling genes encoding BH3-only proteins have been detected in a range of human cancers and these genes knocked out accelerate cancers in mice, which provided evidence that BH3-only proteins can serve as tumour suppressors. BH3 mimetic are being developed for the new molecularly targeted anti-cancer drugs, which may be helpful in designing better therapeutic strategy for treating cancers.