Kinases and Cancer

Protein kinases are a large family of enzymes catalyzing protein phosphorylation. The human genome contains 518 protein kinase genes, 478 of which belong to the classical protein kinase family and 40 are atypical protein kinases. Phosphorylation is one of the critical mechanisms for regulating different cellular functions, such as proliferation, cell cycle, apoptosis, motility, growth, differentiation, among others. Deregulation of kinase activity can result in dramatic changes in these processes. Moreover, deregulated kinases are frequently found to be oncogenic and can be central for the survival and spread of cancer cells [1]. There are several ways for kinases to become involved in cancers: mis-regulated expression and/or amplification, aberrant phosphorylation, mutation, chromosomal translocation, and epigenetic regulation