摘要：

Signal transduction in living cells refers to the conversion of various chemical or physical "input" stimuli into signals that ultimately lead to one or more "outputs" in the form of biological responses. A signal transduction pathway consists of a cascade of interactions between signals and receptors transmitted to effector proteins that undergo various post-translational and allosteric modifications to affect gene expression, protein activity or protein turnover. During their transmission the signals can be amplified by the activities of intermediate effectors or they can be integrated with cellular signals originating from different stimuli. Ultimately some basic cellular function is affected, often at the transcriptional level. The nomenclature established for eukaryotic signal transduction, refers to primary messengers as input signals, while second messengers transmit information intracellularly following the interaction of the input signal with a particular receptor.

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