Description
Product Characteristics: Bfl-1 Antibody: Apoptosis plays a major role in normal organism development, tissue homeostasis, and removal of damaged cells and is caused by caspase activation. Proteins that comprise the Bcl-2 family appear to control the activation of these enzymes. One such member is multi-domain antiapoptotic protein Bfl-1, which is overexpressed in stomach and other cancers. Bfl-1 can interact with Bax and suppress apoptosis by inhibiting the release of cytochrome c and caspase-3 activation. It is upregulated in cisplatin-resistant human bladder tumors, suggesting that its expression may be important for cisplatin resistance and inhibition of apoptosis in cancer cells. At least two isoforms of Bfl-1 are known to exist.
Target Information: This gene encodes a member of the BCL-2 protein family. The proteins of this family form hetero- or homodimers and act as anti- and pro-apoptotic regulators that are involved in a wide variety of cellular activities such as embryonic development, homeostasis and tumorigenesis. The protein encoded by this gene is able to reduce the release of pro-apoptotic cytochrome c from mitochondria and block caspase activation. This gene is a direct transcription target of NF-kappa B in response to inflammatory mediators, and is up-regulated by different extracellular signals, such as granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor (GM-CSF), CD40, phorbol ester and inflammatory cytokine TNF and IL-1, which suggests a cytoprotective function that is essential for lymphocyte activation as well as cell survival. Alternatively spliced transcript variants encoding different isoforms have been found for this gene. [provided by RefSeq, Jul 2008]