Apoptosis - CED-4 is a stranger no more

Research on the nematode wormCaenorhabditis elegans has delivered much of what is known about apoptosis (programmed cell death). About a dozen or so cell death (ced) genes are involved, but one of the most important of them, ced-4, has remained enigmatic. Two papers now lift the veil on the gene and its product. One describes the mammalian homologue, and thus provides further grist for speculation about parallels between the cell-death process in very different organisms. The other shows how CED-4 protein may function; it looks as if it acts as a context-dependent ATPase which facilitates the autoactivation of CED-3, another player in the process.