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Published online
doi:10.1083/jcb.200705193
The Journal of Cell Biology, Vol. 179, No. 3, 375-380
The Rockefeller University Press, 0021-9525 $30.00
© Vercammen et al.
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Are metacaspases caspases?



Dominique Vercammen1,3, Wim Declercq2,4, Peter Vandenabeele2,4, and Frank Van Breusegem1,3

1 Department of Plant Systems Biology and 2 Department for Molecular Biomedical Research, Flanders Institute for Biotechnology, 9052 Gent, Belgium
3 Department of Molecular Genetics and 4 Department of Molecular Biology, Ghent University, 9052 Gent, Belgium

Correspondence to Frank Van Breusegem: frank.vanbreusegem{at}psb.ugent.be

The identification of caspases as major regulators of apoptotic cell death in animals initiated a quest for homologous peptidases in other kingdoms. With the discovery of metacaspases in plants, fungi, and protozoa, this search had apparently reached its goal. However, there is compelling evidence that metacaspases lack caspase activity and that they are not responsible for the caspaselike activities detected during plant and fungal cell death. In this paper, we attempt to broaden the discussion of these peptidases to biological functions beyond apoptosis and cell death. We further suggest that metacaspases and paracaspases, although sharing structural and mechanistic features with the metazoan caspases, form a distinct family of clan CD cysteine peptidases.

Abbreviations used in this paper: AMC, 7-amido-4-methylcoumarin; AtMC, Arabidopsis thaliana metacaspase; HGT, horizontal gene transfer; PS, phosphatidylserine.


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