ABSTRACT
Discovery of a disease-related gene marks only the beginning to a series of difficult investigations. In order to establish the functional role of the newly discovered gene, one has to obtain insights into its biological activities, genetic and epigenetic regulations, and molecular mechanisms operating under various conditions such as in cancer cells and in normal cells. Is it, as examples, involved in growth control, genetic stability, apoptosis, immortalization, differentiation, angiogenesis, invasion and metastasis, etc? What is the molecular biology of its transcription? Does it in turn control the transcription of other genes? Where is its protein product located? What are the biochemical properties of the protein? Is it an enzyme, transcription factor or a structural element, etc? Does it undergo posttranslational modifications, and what effects do these have?
