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The taste of heavy metals: gene regulation by MTF-1.
Journal article

The taste of heavy metals: gene regulation by MTF-1.

  • Günther V Institute of Molecular Life Sciences, University of Zürich, Winterthurerstrasse 190, CH-8057 Zürich, Switzerland.
  • Lindert U
  • Schaffner W
  • 2012-02-01
Published in:
  • Biochimica et biophysica acta. - 2012
Amino Acid Sequence
Animals
Conserved Sequence
DNA-Binding Proteins
Homeostasis
Humans
Hypoxia
Metallothionein
Metals, Heavy
Molecular Sequence Data
Oxidative Stress
Protein Structure, Tertiary
Signal Transduction
Transcription Factors
Transcriptional Activation
English The metal-responsive transcription factor-1 (MTF-1, also termed MRE-binding transcription factor-1 or metal regulatory transcription factor-1) is a pluripotent transcriptional regulator involved in cellular adaptation to various stress conditions, primarily exposure to heavy metals but also to hypoxia or oxidative stress. MTF-1 is evolutionarily conserved from insects to humans and is the main activator of metallothionein genes, which encode small cysteine-rich proteins that can scavenge toxic heavy metals and free radicals. MTF-1 has been suggested to act as an intracellular metal sensor but evidence for direct metal sensing was scarce. Here we review recent advances in our understanding of MTF-1 regulation with a focus on the mechanism underlying heavy metal responsiveness and transcriptional activation mediated by mammalian or Drosophila MTF-1. This article is part of a Special Issue entitled: Cell Biology of Metals.
Language
  • English
Open access status
bronze
Identifiers
Persistent URL
https://sonar.ch/global/documents/160977
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