Potential windows of susceptibility for exposure can be inferred by comparing the information in Table 1 with the timeline of key developmental periods in humans shown in Figure 2. Below we describe examples of xenobiotics that alter lung development by disrupting essential processes such as branching morphogenesis, alveolarization, and cellular differentiation and repair.
They act as an anatomical conduit between retinal neurones and the cellular environment, maintaining retinal homeostasis by participating in essential processes such as glucose metabolism, antioxidant production, ion/substrate exchange and vascular regulation.
Because they rely on the cytoskeleton to complete essential processes such as cell division, they are potentially vulnerable to attack by drugs that target cytoskeletal proteins.
On the other hand, the EMT program sustained by AKT feedback-activation may interfere with malignant cell/microenvironment interactions, thanks to its involvement in essential processes such as migration, invasiveness and cytokine signaling.
Furthermore, the family of PI3Ks plays an important role in the pathogenesis of CVD by modulating several essential biologic processes, such as metabolism, vascular homeostasis and thrombogenicity [ 31].
Disruption of GR activation by DBT can disturb essential physiological processes such as the immune system, as shown by inhibition of glucocorticoid-mediated suppression of pro-inflammatory cytokine production in macrophages.
It plays a crucial role in response to induction by MeJA in many essential physiological processes such as biosynthesis of the cell wall, phytohormones, secondary metabolites, cell division, growth, stress resistance, and photoprotection in plants [ 42].
This process, which is dynamically and temporally regulated by histone acetyltransferases and deacetylases, is crucial for numerous essential biological processes such as transcriptional regulation, cellular signaling, and stress response.
The human proteome contains 120 SH2 domains in 110 distinct proteins, and protein-protein interactions mediated by SH2 domains play a critical role in essential cellular processes such as cell growth, migration, differentiation, and survival [ 3, 4].
Cell polarization is the process by which cells establish asymmetry along a single axis and is essential for processes such as cell migration and asymmetric cell division [1].
