BioCentury
ARTICLE | Targets & Mechanisms

Putting SMYD3 on the MAP

June 12, 2014 7:00 AM UTC

Stanford University and GlaxoSmithKline plc researchers have uncovered the mechanism of action of SMYD3, a histone lysine methyltransferase overexpressed in many lung and pancreatic tumors.1 The surprise was that SMYD3 acts in the cytoplasm to regulate the MAPK pathway and not in the nucleus as previously thought. The discovery implies that inhibiting the enzyme can counter activating mutations in MAPK pathway components such as K-Ras.

SMYD3 (SET and MYND domain containing 3) is a member of a family of histone lysine methyltransferases that typically are epigenetic regulators of chromatin structure in the nucleus.2...