The PI3K/Akt signaling pathway is a major driving force in a variety of cellular functions. Dysregulation of this pathway has been implicated in many human diseases including cancer. While the activity of the cytoplasmic PI3K/Akt pathway has been extensively studied, the functions of these molecules and their effector proteins within the nucleus are poorly understood. Harboring key cellular processes such as DNA replication and repair as well as nascent messenger RNA transcription, the nucleus provides a unique compartmental environment for protein–protein and protein–DNA/RNA interactions required for cell survival, growth, and proliferation. Here we summarize recent advances made toward elucidating the nuclear PI3K/Akt signaling cascade and its key components within the nucleus as they pertain to cell growth and tumorigenesis. This review covers the spatial and temporal localization of the major nuclear kinases having PI3K activities and the counteracting phosphatases as well as the role of nuclear PI3K/Akt signaling in mRNA processing and exportation, DNA replication and repair, ribosome biogenesis, cell survival, and tumorigenesis.
In modern psychiatry, professionals claim to speak to patients as equals, to take them seriously as a person. In this article, the author shares his personal experience, in which he—like other former psychiatric inmates—is reduced to the role of a former patient who is expected only to speak about his personal patient narrative. This happens despite the fact that he received international awards in acknowledgement of exceptional scientific and humanitarian contributions about how to minimize risks of withdrawal from psychiatric drugs, build alternatives beyond psychiatry and develop possibilities for self-help for individuals experiencing madness and strategies toward implementing humane and ethical treatment. Can psychiatry solve its intrinsic ethical problems when professionals do not leave behind their roles as “experts” (and users and survivors of psychiatry their roles as “patients”) and their associations continue to refuse even discussion about psychiatric human rights violations?
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