PMID: 7537010Mar 1, 1995Paper

Role of intracellular calcium in the programmed cell death of prostatic cancer cells

Acta urologica Belgica
B TombalJ M Gillis

Abstract

The growth of any tissue depends on the quantitative relationship between the rate of cell proliferation and cell death. In normal adults tissues, this steady-state balance is regulated by a series of both systemic hormones and local growth factors. Programmed cell death, also called apoptosis, is one of the two pathways for cell death. In programmed cell death, specific intracellular signals induce the cell to undergo an active, energy-dependent process leading to a cascade of biochemical and morphologic events that result in the irreversible fragmentation of genomic DNA and then of the cell itself. Biochemical and morphological studies have demonstrated that the involution of the normal, hyperplastic and cancerous prostate after castration is the result of programmed cell death. Numerous group have studied the role of calcium in programmed cell death's triggering. In androgen-independent prostatic cell it had been proved that it was possible to trigger programmed cell death by inducing a sustained elevation of the intracellular calcium. Actually, some features tend to explain more precisely the exact role of calcium in apoptosis of prostatic cells.

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Apoptosis

Apoptosis is a specific process that leads to programmed cell death through the activation of an evolutionary conserved intracellular pathway leading to pathognomic cellular changes distinct from cellular necrosis