Cell death, or apoptosis, plays an important role in biological processes and disease and offers special opportunities to develop new therapies for cancer, autoimmune disease, stroke, heart attack, and Alzheimer's disease. In Death Receptors in Cancer Therapy, leading physician-scientists and basic researchers review in depth our latest understanding of the molecular events that regulate cell death, illuminating those molecules that provide targets for agonists or antagonists designed to modulate death signaling for therapeutic purposes. The authors focus on the extrinsic system of death receptors, their regulation and function, and their abnormalities in cancer. Topics of particlar interest include resistance to apoptosis, TRAIL signaling, death receptors in embryonic development, mechanisms of caspase activation, and death receptor mutations in cancer. Additional chapters address death signaling in melanoma, synthetic retinoids and death receptors, the role of p53 in death receptor regulation, immune suppression of cancer, and combination therapy with death ligands.
Authoritative and up-to-date, Death Receptors in Cancer Therapy offers a timely compendium of cell death signaling pathways for those seeking either a basic understanding of apoptosis or the knowledge needed to develop new therapeutics that will activate or block death signaling in disease.

Zusammenfassung
An in depth review of our latest understanding of the molecular events that regulate cell death and those molecules that provide targets for developing agonists or antagonists to modulate death signaling for therapeutic purposes. The authors focus on the extrinsic system of death receptors, their regulation and function, and their abnormalities in cancer. Topics of particular interest include resistance to apoptosis, TRAIL signaling, death receptors in embryonic development, mechanisms of caspase activation, and death receptor mutations in cancer. Additional chapters address death signaling in melanoma, synthetic retinoids and death receptors, the role of p53 in death receptor regulation, immune suppression of cancer, and combination therapy with death ligands.

Inhalt
Mammalian Cell Death Pathways.- Resistance to Apoptosis in Cancer Therapy.- Structures of TNF Receptors and Their Interactions With Ligands.- Death Receptor Signaling in Embryonic Ectodermal Development.- Adaptor Proteins in Death Receptor Signaling.- Caspase Activation by the Extrinsic Pathway.- Death Signaling and Therapeutic Applications of TRAIL.- Death Receptor Mutations.- Regulation of Death Receptors.- Regulation of Trail Receptor Expression in Human Melanoma.- Regulation of Death Receptors by Synthetic Retinoids.- Role of p53 in Regulation of Death Receptors.- Proapoptotic Gene Silencing Via Methylation in Human Tumors.- Regulation of Death Receptor-Induced Apoptosis by NF-?B and Interferon Signaling Pathways.- TRAIL in Cancer Therapy.- Expression and Regulation of Death Receptors in Multiple Myeloma and Prostate Carcinoma.- Regulation of TRAIL-Induced Apoptosis by Transcriptional Factors.- Sensitizing Tumor Cells by Targeting Death Receptor Signaling Inhibitors.- Ceramide, Ceramidase, and FasL Gene Therapy in Prostate Cancer.- Gene Therapy Targeting Receptor-Mediated Cell Death to Cancers.- Combination of Chemotherapy and Death Ligands in Cancer Therapy.