Pak GITs to Aurora-A

Abstract

The protein kinase Aurora-A orchestrates key aspects of cell division, but its regulation has remained a major puzzle. That puzzle is now one step closer to being solved thanks to a recent paper by Zhao et al. appearing in the October 28(th) issue of Molecular Cell. In this work, the authors show that p21-activated kinases (Paks), previously best known for their role in cytoskeletal and transcriptional signaling pathways, also play an important role in centrosome dynamics via phosphorylation and activation of Aurora-A.