PLK Signaling Pathway

1. PLK Signaling Pathway Polo-like kinase (PLK) is a highly conserved serine/threonine protein kinase with a highly homologous serine/threonine kinase domain at its N-terminus, which regulates PLK activity and subcellular dynamics at the C-terminus and targeted polo-box domain (PBD). There are many PLK family members, and there are four subtypes in the human body, namely PLK1, PLK2, PLK3, and PLK4, which play important roles in the regulation of various phases of the cell cycle. Among the four family members, the current research on PLK1 is the most thorough. PLK proteins regulate many key steps in the cell cycle, including the formation of bipolar spindles, chromosome segregation, late regulation of complexes, and cytokinesis. PLK is a very effective anticancer strategy as a target for inhibiting spindle formation during mitosis, thereby preventing cancer cell division. PLK family The most thorough study in the PLK family is PLK1. The first gene of PLK was reported in 1994, which is located at 16p12, with a mRNA length of about 2.3 kb, encoding a protein with a molecular mass of about 66000. Its amino acid sequence and drosophila Polo and yeast CDC5 and other genes have greater homology, and there is a highly conserved catalytic region at the N-terminus. The C-terminal PBD consists of two conserved regions called polo boxes. PLK1 plays an important role in the normal operation of the cell cycle, centrosome maturation, and cytoplasmic separation, but it is overexpressed in most human tumor cells, and this overexpression is often accompanied by a poor prognosis. Therefore, examining the expression level of PLK1 in cells is of great significance for the early diagnosis of tumors and the prediction of tumor patients' prognosis. In addition to PLK1, the most studied is PLK4.