Revisiting ZAR proteins: the understudied regulator of female fertility and beyond.
Cell Mol Life Sci
; 79(2): 92, 2022 Jan 24.
Article
en En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-35072788
ABSTRACT
Putative RNA-binding proteins (RBPs), zygote arrested-1 (ZAR1), and ZAR2 (also known as ZAR1L), have been identified as maternal factors that mainly function in oogenesis and embryogenesis. Despite divergence in their spatio-temporal expression among species, the CxxC structure of the C-terminus of ZAR proteins is highly conserved and is reported to be the functional domain for the activity of the RBPs of ZAR proteins. In oocytes from Xenopus laevis and zebrafish, ZAR proteins have been reported to bind to maternal transcripts and inhibit translation in immature growing oocytes, whereas in fully grown mouse oocytes, they promote the translation during meiotic maturation. Thus, ZAR1 and ZAR2 may be required for the maternal-to-zygotic transition by stabilizing the maternal transcriptome in oocytes with partial functional redundancy. In addition, recent studies have suggested non-ovarian expression and function of ZAR proteins, particularly their involvement in tumorigenesis. ZAR proteins are potentially associated with tumor suppressors and can serve as epigenetically inactivated cancer biomarkers. In this review, studies on Zar1/2 are systematically summarized, and some issues that require discussion and further investigation are introduced as perspectives.
Palabras clave
Texto completo:
1
Banco de datos:
MEDLINE
Asunto principal:
Oogénesis
/
Proteínas del Huevo
/
Proteínas Supresoras de Tumor
/
Fertilidad
Tipo de estudio:
Prognostic_studies
Límite:
Animals
/
Female
/
Humans
Idioma:
En
Revista:
Cell Mol Life Sci
Asunto de la revista:
BIOLOGIA MOLECULAR
Año:
2022
Tipo del documento:
Article
País de afiliación:
China