摘要：

We have cloned the C. elegans cell death gene ted-3. A ted-3 transcript is most abundant during embryo- genesis, the stage during which most programmed cell deaths occur. The predicted CED3 protein shows sim- ilarity to human and murine interleukin-1 P-converting enzyme and to the product of the mouse nedd-2 gene, which is expressed in the embryonic brain. The se- quences of 12 ted-3 mutations as well as the se- quences of ted-3 genes from two related nematode species identify sites of potential functional impor- tance. We propose that the CED-3 protein acts as a cysteine protease in the initiation of programmed cell death in C. elegans and that cysteine proteases also function in programmed cell death in mammals.

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