Gatekeepers of pancreas: TEAD and YAP

Abstract

The pancreas hosts some of the most debilitating and deadly diseases, including pancreatic cancer and diabetes mellitus. In autoimmune diabetes, for example, there is a massive destruction of the insulin producing cells of the pancreas. Pancreatic developmental defects can also result in a deficit of this cell type. To revert these important pancreatic diseases, researchers are currently trying to artificially generate insulin producing beta-cells for implantation and, in this way, suppress insulin administration [1]. However, to derive cells that function properly it is necessary to understand in depth the instructions that our body uses to produce them during fetal development. On the other hand, regarding pancreatic cancer, it is known that tumor cells very often recover characteristics similar to those of embryonic cells [2]. These are clear examples of the relevance to understand the identity of pancreatic progenitor cells.