Integrating the cell stress response: a new view of molecular chaperones as immunological and physiological homeostatic regulators.

The response of cells to stress was first documented in the 1960s and 1970s and the molecular nature of the families of proteins that subserve this vital response, the molecular chaperones, were identified and subjected to critical study in the period from the late 1980s. This resulted in the rapidly advancing new field of protein folding and its role in cellular function. Emerging at the same time, but initially largely ignored, were reports that molecular chaperones could be released by cells and exist on the outer plasma membrane or in the body fluids. These secreted molecular chaperones were found to have intercellular signalling functions. There is now a growing body of evidence to support the hypothesis that molecular chaperones have properties ascribed to the Roman god Janus, the god of gates, doors, beginnings and endings, whose two faces point in different directions. Molecular chaperones appear to have one set of key functions within the cell and, potentially, a separate set of functions when they exist on the cell surface or in the various fluid phases of the body. Thus, it is a likely hypothesis that secreted molecular chaperones act as an additional level of homeostatic control possibly linking cellular stress to physiological systems such as the immune system. This review concentrates on three key molecular chaperones: Hsp10, Hsp60 and the Hsp70 family for which most information is available. An important consideration is the role that these proteins may play in human disease and in the treatment of human disease. 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.