MINIFOCUS: Adhesion

In this issue, we present a collection of four articles discussing different aspects of cellular adhesion. Cell–cell and cell–matrix adhesions are crucial for the accurate maintenance of tissues, and perturbations in cell adhesion can have detrimental effects. First, the Cell Science at a Glance by Ronen Zaidel-Bar (p. 373) presents the Cadherin adhesome, or ‘Cadhesome’, which comprises over 170 proteins that have been shown to date to interact with cadherin, the main factor mediating cell–cell adhesions. On the basis of this extensive network, the author suggests that the cellular role of cadherin is far more complex than that depicted in textbook models. In the first of three Commentaries, Vania Braga and colleagues (p. 379) discuss the small GTPases that control the levels of active Rho, a well known regulator of cell–cell junctions, and propose that this control is reciprocal: junctions can also modulate the activity of small GTPases to drive contact-dependent cellular events. The second Commentary by Valerie Brunton and colleagues (p. 393) explores the role of E-cadherin in tumour cell invasion and metastasis. They emphasize the importance of the interplay between E-cadherin and cell–ECM interactions mediated by integrin matrix receptors. In our final Minifocus article, Stephan Huveneers and Johan de Rooij (p. 403) have a close look at the mechanotransduction at cell–cell junctions, which they suggest emerges as an important signalling mechanism with relevance for tissue development and disease.