Clearing the Dead: Apoptotic Cell Sensing, Recognition, Engulfment, and Digestion

Overview

Journal Cold Spring Harb Perspect Biol

Specialties Biology
Molecular Biology

Date 2013 Jan 4

PMID 23284042

Citations 283

Authors

Amelia Hochreiter-Hufford

Kodi S Ravichandran

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Clearance of apoptotic cells is the final stage of programmed cell death. Uncleared corpses can become secondarily necrotic, promoting inflammation and autoimmunity. Remarkably, even in tissues with high cellular turnover, apoptotic cells are rarely seen because of efficient clearance mechanisms in healthy individuals. Recently, significant progress has been made in understanding the steps involved in prompt cell clearance in vivo. These include the sensing of corpses via "find me" signals, the recognition of corpses via "eat me" signals and their cognate receptors, the signaling pathways that regulate cytoskeletal rearrangement necessary for engulfment, and the responses of the phagocyte that keep cell clearance events "immunologically silent." This study focuses on our understanding of these steps.

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