This contribution presents an updated analysis of the evolution of ribosome-inactivating proteins (RIPs) in plants. All evidence suggests that an ancestor of modern seed plants developed the RIP domain at least 300 million years ago. This ancestral RIP domain gave rise to a direct lineage of type 1 RIPs (i.e., primary type 1 RIPs) still present today in many monocots and at least one dicot. In ...

Retinoblastoma (Rb), a tumor suppressor gene, is inactivated in many types of cancer. However little is known about how the loss of Rb function can be targeted in cancer therapies. We have identified that inactivation of TSC2 in Rb mutant cancer cells will induce a synergistic cell death. The synergistic cell death is due to an increase in cellular stress including metabolic, ER, and oxidative ...