Protein Degradation

Edited By: Karen Young Kreeger
C.L. Ward, S. Omura, R.R. Kopito, "Degradation of CFTR by the ubiquitin-proteasome pathway," Cell, 83:121-7, 1995. (Cited in nearly 50 publications as of March 1997) Comments by Ron R. Kopito and Cristina L. Ward, Department of Biological Sciences, Stanford University

'LIFTING OF THE VEIL': Stanford’s Ron Kopito and Cristina Ward identified a membrane protein involved in the ubiquitin-proteasome pathway.

This paper is the first to identify a plasma membrane protein whose degradation appears to be critically dependent on the ubiquitin-proteasome pathway. This pathway-where specific cellular proteins are broken down-has become a hot area of research in the last two years.

What started off as a "trickle of interest in the field -more or less with our paper-has turned into a geyser of subsequent papers," observes Ron Kopito, a professor of biology at Stanford University. His lab worked with a protein called the cystic...