EGF receptor activation prevents microbes from going more than skin deep
Our skin not only serves as a physical barrier against infection but skin cells themselves can mount an immune response to kill invading microbes by producing antimicrobial polypeptides (AMPs). . As overt infection in the skin is a rare event, researchers have theorized that AMPs must not only help fight infection, but play a role in preventing infection from developing in the first place. In a s...The Epidermal Growth Factor Receptor (EGFR), a so-called kinase protein, is often abnormally active in cancer. A new class of anticancer drugs inhibiting the activated EGFR kinase have shown to be effective against such cancers, especially lung cancer. In a new study in PLoS Medicine, researchers have catalogued and characterized the mutations in the EGFR gene that occur in glioblastoma, a deadly...