Claudin-1 is an integral membrane protein of about 23 kDa, mapada on chromosome 3, whose function is cell adhesion. Is involved in cell growth and maintenance and is present in the tight junctions between cells, structures whose main functions emphasizes maintaining the differentiation state of epithelial cells. Recently it was reported that claudin may be, if not cause, itself a marker for the progression of certain carcinomas and metastases.

Signed a collaborative work by groups at the University of Barcelona, the Autonomous University of Madrid, the CSIC, the University of Milan and the company Advancell the PCB has become the posthumous publication of Dr. Senen Vilaro, estimated researcher University of Barcelona and Advancell, who died recently and remembered in an obituary included in this newsletter SEBBM. The article describes the action exerted on claudin-1 transcription factors Snail and Slug families, zinc finger repressors of certain processes that occur during cancer progression.

These regulatory proteins also play its action on other adhesion molecules such as E-cadherin, specific binding to promoter regions (boxes E). It appears that this same interaction is exercised Snail and Slug to the grounds E of human claudin-1 promoter, which displayed band shift (electrophoretic method to detect the binding of DNA and protein). And not only that, but there is an inverse correlation between the amounts of claudin-1 and Slug transcripts in cancer cell lines. In its comments on the levels of claudin 1, and the factors Snail and Slug in human tumors, the authors of this study support the hypothesis that a gene in this cell adhesion protein gene is target of these repressors in epithelial cells.