New article about cell recovery from the brink of death in PNAS

Denise Montell, CALS-affiliated faculty member's recent work published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) shows that cells can recover from the brink of cell death.

The significance of the work, as quoted from the PNAS publication indicates that, "This property enhances tissue repair after injury but is also co-opted by cancer cells to survive chemo- and radiation therapies. By combining sophisticated tools to deliver and measure precise doses of caspase-3 activity directly in living cells, we address two key questions regarding recovery from apoptotic induction. Can cells recover from direct activation of executioner-caspase, or is survival a consequence of drug-induced stress responses that occur together with death signaling? And, to what extent do caspase signaling levels and/or dynamics determine cell fate? Here, we report the extent and limitations of caspase activity in determining cell fate."

Nano, M., Mondo, J. A., Harwood, J., Balasanyan, V., and Montell, D. J. (2023). Cell survival following direct executioner-caspase activation. PNAS, 120(4), e2216531120.