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Special issue: Intermediate filaments
E XP E RI ME N TA L CE L L RE S E A RCH 3 1 3 ( 2 00 7 ) 1 9 7 9 –19 8 0
a v a i l a b l e a t w w w. s c i e n c e d i r e c t . c o m
w w w. e l s e v i e r. c o m / l o c a t e / y e x c r
Preface
Special issue: Intermediate filaments The intermediate filament (IF) field has witnessed a remarkable evolution and revolution during the past 30 years. The evolution can be envisioned in several ways but clearly the most critical aspects are the realization that the IF family of proteins are not simply static structural proteins. The static label of IFs may have persisted in biological textbooks, in part, because of the relative insolubility of IFs, their poorly understood functions through the 1980s and into the early 1990s, and the representation of a subgroup of IFs (i.e., the “hard” keratins) in skin appendages of members of the animal kingdom (e.g., bird feathers, reptile scales, hair, nail, hoof and horn). Within cells, however, IFs represent a highly dynamic and major component of the cytoskeleton that interacts with a growing list of signaling, chaperone and other regulatory proteins to impart a number of structural and nonstructural functions. The IF family includes the type I and II keratins; the type III vimentin, desmin, glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP), peripherin, and syncoilin; the type IV neurofilaments, α-internexin, nestin, and synemin; the “orphan” cytoskeletal protein 49 (CP49) and filensin; and the nuclear type V lamins. The revolution in the IF field is reflected by the explosion in the number of diseases (now numbering more than 45 different diseases!) that are caused, or predisposed to by mutations in IF genes. The initial finding of mutations in epidermal keratins was the igniting force that led to the realization and subsequent confirmation that the broad tissue-selective expression of IFs also reflects a wide array of tissue-specific diseases. An equally if not more spectacular development pertained to lamins, whereby more than 230 mutations have been described thereby rendering the lamin A gene, LMNA, one of the most frequently mutated in the human genome. Mutations in LMNA give rise to a dizzying array of more than ten, partially overlapping diseases including muscular dystrophies, cardiomyopathies, lipodystrophies, and premature aging syndromes. Hence, it is becoming clear that studying IFs is essential for understanding cytoplasmic and nuclear architecture, chromatin organization, regulation of gene expression, signaling and apoptosis, the pathogenesis of a broad range of IF-associated human diseases, and the development of targeted therapies for these diseases. During the past 10 years, several excellent and highly cited reviews pertaining to IFs have been published. In terms of “review series” or “books” related to IFs, the number is limited. In 1996, one of us (H.H.) edited, together with Robin R. Harris, a volume on “Intermediate Filaments” published in Subcellular Biochemistry [1]. This 1996 volume included 20 reviews authored
by leading laboratories in the field. Since then, a Methods in Cell Biology volume on Intermediate Filaments was published in 2004 [2]. The Methods volume included 29 reviews that provided a comprehensive resource of methodology essentials for studying IFs in a broad range of organisms and biological contexts. In 2006, Jesus Paramio edited a book titled “Intermediate Filaments” that included 10 chapters. The 2006 book focused primarily on keratins with some coverage given to neural intermediate filaments and desmin [3]. Hence, the feeling of the editors of this current series, in consultation with several investigators in the IF field, is that putting together a state-of-the-art and comprehensive review series on IFs would be beneficial not only in terms of providing an update but also in providing a single and thorough resource for those who are actively working in the field or those considering to join the field. This is where the two guest editors of the series, M.B.O. and H.H., owe an immense debt of gratitude to Experimental Cell Research (ECR) and to Urban Lendahl (Editor-in-Chief of ECR) for providing the “opera house” to allow the assembly of a truly outstanding collection of review performances given by a first-rate group of performers. It is important to highlight several unique and special features of this review series. First, it is comprehensive and covers essentially all IF proteins and some of their associated partners, as can be quickly gleaned from scanning the table of contents and its list of 25 reviews. Second, the reviews are authoritative and written by experts in the field. More importantly and a very unique aspect of this review series is that many of the reviews are co-authored by aficionados who may not have coauthored reviews together. We feel extremely fortunate to be able to bring together these expert and established investigators to provide a uniform perspective on various aspects pertaining to IFs. Examples include: (i) Uitto and McGrath (diseases of epidermal keratins and their linker proteins), (ii) Schweizer, Langbein and Rogers (hair keratins and their diseases), (iii) Magin and Leube (structural and regulatory functions of keratins), (iv) Zatloukal, French, Cadrin, Harada and Omary (keratin cytoplasmic inclusions in liver disease). It should be noted here, that this particular review proposes to modify the name of hepatocyte Mallory bodies to Mallory-Denk bodies in honor of Helmut Denk. This suggested renaming was supported by 20 internationally renowned hepatopathologists and hepatologists, (v) Eriksson and Ivaska (new functions of vimentin), (vi) Capetanaki and Bloch (muscle IFs), (vii) Quinlan, Brenner, Goldman and Messing (GFAP), (viii) Szaro and Strong (posttranscriptional control of
1980
E XP E RI ME N TA L CE LL RE S E A RCH 3 1 3 ( 2 00 7 ) 1 9 7 9 –19 8 0
neurofilaments), (ix) Inagaki, Shea and Pant (Types III and IV IF phosphorylation), (x) Julien and Garcia (neurofilament transport), (xi) Worman and Bonne (laminopathies), (xii) Hegele and J. Oshima (“phenomics” and lamins), (xiii) Stewart and Young (mouse models of the laminopathies), (xiv) Gruenbaum and Krohne (inverterbrate lamins), (xv) Schirmer and Foisner (lamin-associated proteins), (xvi) Sonnenberg and Liem (plakins), (xvii) Parry, Strelkov, Burkhard, Aebi and Herrmann (IF structure and assembly), (xviii) Norlen and Hoenger (cryoelectron tomography of IFs), (xix) Janmey and Laterrier (biophysical properties of IFs), (xx) Pekny and Lane (IFs and stress), (xxi) Marceau, Schutte, Gilbert, Loranger, and Ramaekers (IFs and apoptosis). The series of reviews opens with a personal perspective by R. Oshima on how he views the historical development of the IF field. Third, the reviews are all up to date and critically reviewed. For example, all the reviews were submitted during December and early January 2006/2007, and each manuscript was promptly reviewed by two reviewers and by the editors, and all were revised once or twice. Our wish is that this review series will serve its intended purpose of helping disseminate the field of Intermediate Filaments to a broad range of investigators. We hope that new comers to the field will share our excitement for the field and appreciate how IFs touch on so many other biological systems and disease processes.
Acknowledgments The assembly of this review series was made possible by many facets coming into perfect alignment. We are eternally indebted to all the authors for putting up with our nagging, and for coming through with their reviews and revisions in such a timely manner. We also wish to thank the expert authors who had not previously or recently published together but were willing to put aside first/senior authorship potential issues and work jointly to provide a consensus review.
Gratitude also goes to the reviewers, many but not all of whom were authors of other reviews in the series, for providing very helpful reviews that set a high bar for the overall quality of the reviews. We also wish to extend a special thank you to Urban Lendahl for trusting us, lobbying on our behalf to provide ECR as a forum for this review series, and for providing the services of his office to help see this project to fruition. The ECR team has been an absolute pleasure to work with. Nina Sunden and Susan Ikeda in the Stockholm and San Diego ECR offices, respectively, were spectacular in promptly sending out the manuscripts for review and in handling the entire review process and assembly of manuscripts for publication. In addition, Nina played an instrumental role in arranging the review series, “booking” all the high-powered authors, and several other editorial aspects that made the entire process seamless.
REFERENCES
[1] Intermediate filaments, in: H. Herrmann, J. Robin Harris (Eds.), Subcellular Biochem., vol. 31, Plenum Press, 1998. [2] Intermediate filament cytoskeleton, in: M.B. Omary, P.A. Coulombe (Eds.), Methods Cell Biol., vol. 78, Elsevier Academic Press, 2004. [3] Intermediate Filaments. Edited by J. Paramio (2006). Landes Bioscience and Springer Science.
M. Bishr Omary*, Guest Editor Harald Herrmann, Guest co-Editor Urban Lendahl, ECR Editor-in-Chief *E-mail address: [email protected]. 9 April 2007 0014-4827/$ – see front matter © 2007 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.yexcr.2007.04.011
a v a i l a b l e a t w w w. s c i e n c e d i r e c t . c o m
w w w. e l s e v i e r. c o m / l o c a t e / y e x c r
Preface
Special issue: Intermediate filaments The intermediate filament (IF) field has witnessed a remarkable evolution and revolution during the past 30 years. The evolution can be envisioned in several ways but clearly the most critical aspects are the realization that the IF family of proteins are not simply static structural proteins. The static label of IFs may have persisted in biological textbooks, in part, because of the relative insolubility of IFs, their poorly understood functions through the 1980s and into the early 1990s, and the representation of a subgroup of IFs (i.e., the “hard” keratins) in skin appendages of members of the animal kingdom (e.g., bird feathers, reptile scales, hair, nail, hoof and horn). Within cells, however, IFs represent a highly dynamic and major component of the cytoskeleton that interacts with a growing list of signaling, chaperone and other regulatory proteins to impart a number of structural and nonstructural functions. The IF family includes the type I and II keratins; the type III vimentin, desmin, glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP), peripherin, and syncoilin; the type IV neurofilaments, α-internexin, nestin, and synemin; the “orphan” cytoskeletal protein 49 (CP49) and filensin; and the nuclear type V lamins. The revolution in the IF field is reflected by the explosion in the number of diseases (now numbering more than 45 different diseases!) that are caused, or predisposed to by mutations in IF genes. The initial finding of mutations in epidermal keratins was the igniting force that led to the realization and subsequent confirmation that the broad tissue-selective expression of IFs also reflects a wide array of tissue-specific diseases. An equally if not more spectacular development pertained to lamins, whereby more than 230 mutations have been described thereby rendering the lamin A gene, LMNA, one of the most frequently mutated in the human genome. Mutations in LMNA give rise to a dizzying array of more than ten, partially overlapping diseases including muscular dystrophies, cardiomyopathies, lipodystrophies, and premature aging syndromes. Hence, it is becoming clear that studying IFs is essential for understanding cytoplasmic and nuclear architecture, chromatin organization, regulation of gene expression, signaling and apoptosis, the pathogenesis of a broad range of IF-associated human diseases, and the development of targeted therapies for these diseases. During the past 10 years, several excellent and highly cited reviews pertaining to IFs have been published. In terms of “review series” or “books” related to IFs, the number is limited. In 1996, one of us (H.H.) edited, together with Robin R. Harris, a volume on “Intermediate Filaments” published in Subcellular Biochemistry [1]. This 1996 volume included 20 reviews authored
by leading laboratories in the field. Since then, a Methods in Cell Biology volume on Intermediate Filaments was published in 2004 [2]. The Methods volume included 29 reviews that provided a comprehensive resource of methodology essentials for studying IFs in a broad range of organisms and biological contexts. In 2006, Jesus Paramio edited a book titled “Intermediate Filaments” that included 10 chapters. The 2006 book focused primarily on keratins with some coverage given to neural intermediate filaments and desmin [3]. Hence, the feeling of the editors of this current series, in consultation with several investigators in the IF field, is that putting together a state-of-the-art and comprehensive review series on IFs would be beneficial not only in terms of providing an update but also in providing a single and thorough resource for those who are actively working in the field or those considering to join the field. This is where the two guest editors of the series, M.B.O. and H.H., owe an immense debt of gratitude to Experimental Cell Research (ECR) and to Urban Lendahl (Editor-in-Chief of ECR) for providing the “opera house” to allow the assembly of a truly outstanding collection of review performances given by a first-rate group of performers. It is important to highlight several unique and special features of this review series. First, it is comprehensive and covers essentially all IF proteins and some of their associated partners, as can be quickly gleaned from scanning the table of contents and its list of 25 reviews. Second, the reviews are authoritative and written by experts in the field. More importantly and a very unique aspect of this review series is that many of the reviews are co-authored by aficionados who may not have coauthored reviews together. We feel extremely fortunate to be able to bring together these expert and established investigators to provide a uniform perspective on various aspects pertaining to IFs. Examples include: (i) Uitto and McGrath (diseases of epidermal keratins and their linker proteins), (ii) Schweizer, Langbein and Rogers (hair keratins and their diseases), (iii) Magin and Leube (structural and regulatory functions of keratins), (iv) Zatloukal, French, Cadrin, Harada and Omary (keratin cytoplasmic inclusions in liver disease). It should be noted here, that this particular review proposes to modify the name of hepatocyte Mallory bodies to Mallory-Denk bodies in honor of Helmut Denk. This suggested renaming was supported by 20 internationally renowned hepatopathologists and hepatologists, (v) Eriksson and Ivaska (new functions of vimentin), (vi) Capetanaki and Bloch (muscle IFs), (vii) Quinlan, Brenner, Goldman and Messing (GFAP), (viii) Szaro and Strong (posttranscriptional control of
1980
E XP E RI ME N TA L CE LL RE S E A RCH 3 1 3 ( 2 00 7 ) 1 9 7 9 –19 8 0
neurofilaments), (ix) Inagaki, Shea and Pant (Types III and IV IF phosphorylation), (x) Julien and Garcia (neurofilament transport), (xi) Worman and Bonne (laminopathies), (xii) Hegele and J. Oshima (“phenomics” and lamins), (xiii) Stewart and Young (mouse models of the laminopathies), (xiv) Gruenbaum and Krohne (inverterbrate lamins), (xv) Schirmer and Foisner (lamin-associated proteins), (xvi) Sonnenberg and Liem (plakins), (xvii) Parry, Strelkov, Burkhard, Aebi and Herrmann (IF structure and assembly), (xviii) Norlen and Hoenger (cryoelectron tomography of IFs), (xix) Janmey and Laterrier (biophysical properties of IFs), (xx) Pekny and Lane (IFs and stress), (xxi) Marceau, Schutte, Gilbert, Loranger, and Ramaekers (IFs and apoptosis). The series of reviews opens with a personal perspective by R. Oshima on how he views the historical development of the IF field. Third, the reviews are all up to date and critically reviewed. For example, all the reviews were submitted during December and early January 2006/2007, and each manuscript was promptly reviewed by two reviewers and by the editors, and all were revised once or twice. Our wish is that this review series will serve its intended purpose of helping disseminate the field of Intermediate Filaments to a broad range of investigators. We hope that new comers to the field will share our excitement for the field and appreciate how IFs touch on so many other biological systems and disease processes.
Acknowledgments The assembly of this review series was made possible by many facets coming into perfect alignment. We are eternally indebted to all the authors for putting up with our nagging, and for coming through with their reviews and revisions in such a timely manner. We also wish to thank the expert authors who had not previously or recently published together but were willing to put aside first/senior authorship potential issues and work jointly to provide a consensus review.
Gratitude also goes to the reviewers, many but not all of whom were authors of other reviews in the series, for providing very helpful reviews that set a high bar for the overall quality of the reviews. We also wish to extend a special thank you to Urban Lendahl for trusting us, lobbying on our behalf to provide ECR as a forum for this review series, and for providing the services of his office to help see this project to fruition. The ECR team has been an absolute pleasure to work with. Nina Sunden and Susan Ikeda in the Stockholm and San Diego ECR offices, respectively, were spectacular in promptly sending out the manuscripts for review and in handling the entire review process and assembly of manuscripts for publication. In addition, Nina played an instrumental role in arranging the review series, “booking” all the high-powered authors, and several other editorial aspects that made the entire process seamless.
REFERENCES
[1] Intermediate filaments, in: H. Herrmann, J. Robin Harris (Eds.), Subcellular Biochem., vol. 31, Plenum Press, 1998. [2] Intermediate filament cytoskeleton, in: M.B. Omary, P.A. Coulombe (Eds.), Methods Cell Biol., vol. 78, Elsevier Academic Press, 2004. [3] Intermediate Filaments. Edited by J. Paramio (2006). Landes Bioscience and Springer Science.
M. Bishr Omary*, Guest Editor Harald Herrmann, Guest co-Editor Urban Lendahl, ECR Editor-in-Chief *E-mail address: [email protected]. 9 April 2007 0014-4827/$ – see front matter © 2007 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.yexcr.2007.04.011