Anti-beta-Catenin Purified (To be Discontinued; refer to monoclonal, Cat. No. 14-2567)

Description: The polyclonal antibody reacts with mouse, human, and rat beta-catenin; the antibody was raised against a peptide mapping to the carboxy terminal domain of human beta-catenin. The multifunctional beta-catenin protein was originally identified through its association with the cadherin class of cell adhesion proteins (1&2). It was later found to be an integral part of signal transduction pathways and the best studied is the Wnt/beta-catenin pathway (3). Wnt signaling inhibits the degradation of beta-catenin and as a result beta-catenin becomes transcriptionally active (3-5). The deregulation of Wnt signaling leads to the accumulation of beta-catenin, allowing it to become transcriptionally active for a number of genes. Many of these genes are associated with cancer, such as colorectal cancer and melanomas (3&4).

References:
1. Hinck L, Nathke IS, Papkoff J, Nelson WJ. 1994. ?-catenin: a common target for the regulation of cell adhesion by Wnt-1 and Src signaling pathways. Trends Biochem Sci. 19(12):538-542.
2. Bullions LC, Levine AJ. 1998. The role of ?-catenin in cell adhesion, signal transduction, and cancer. Curr Opin Oncol. 10(1):81-87.
3. Moon RT, Bowerman B, Boutros M, Perrimon N. 2002. The promise and perils of Wnt signaling through ?-catenin. Science 296(5573):1644-1646.
4. Li H, Pamukcu R, Thompson WJ. 2002. ?-catenin signaling: therapeutic strategies in oncology. Cancer Biol Ther. (6):621-625.
5. Hecht A, Kemler R. 2000. Curbing the nuclear activities of ?-catenin. Control over Wnt target gene expression. EMBO 1(1):24-28.