Signal transduction pathways as targets for therapeutics.

Meeting information: AAAS 2001 Annual Meeting and Science Innovation Exposition, San Francisco, California, February 15 through 20, 2001. Science's STKE sponsored a symposium at the AAAS Annual Meeting in February 2001. Five speakers addressed the signaling pathways that are modified in wide-ranging pathologies including inflammation, impotence, diabetes, obesity, and cancer. The molecular targets of signaling pathways included cell surface molecules, such as the G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs) and receptor tyrosine kinases, and intracellular signaling components, such as phosphodiesterases (PDEs) and components of the small guanosine triphosphatase (GTPase) Ras signaling pathway. Analysis of the therapeutic strategies to impinge on these various pathways provides insight into both the potential of signaling pathways as relevant drug targets and the possible pitfalls that make complex signaling networks unpredictably difficult targets for such manipulation.