In this review, Maddalena Costanzo and Chiara Zurzolo examine how recent exciting data suggest that the transmissibility of misfolded proteins within the brain is a property that reaches far beyond the rare prion diseases, and discuss the evidence supporting prion-like spreading of amyloidogenic proteins.

In this paper, Simon Morley and colleagues show that mRNAs encoding some structural and regulatory components of the WAVE [WASP (Wiskott-Aldrich syndrome protein) verprolin homologous] complex are localized to the leading edge of the cell and are associated with sites of active translation, and discuss how localized protein synthesis has a pivotal role in controlling cell spreading and migration.

In this paper, Levi Beverley, Leah Siskind and colleagues demonstrate that direct inhibition of anti-apoptotic BCL2 proteins with the small-molecule BH3 mimetic ABT-263 is sufficient to induce C₁₆-ceramide synthesis in multiple cell lines, including human leukaemia and myeloma cells.

In this paper, Camilla Fröhlich and colleagues show how ADAM (a disintegrin and metalloproteinase)12 is expressed in the tumour vasculature and mediates ectodomain shedding of several membrane-anchored endothelial proteins, including VE (vascular endotheial)-cadherin, Flk-1 (fetal liver kinase 1), Tie-2 and VCAM-1 (vascular cell adhesion molecule 1).