Exploring cellular stress response and chaperones

Since the pioneering discovery of heat shock proteins in Drosophila by Ferruccio Ritossa
in 1960s, a long and exciting journey has been undertaken by molecular biologists and researchers
worldwide. Not only lower organisms like worms, yeast, amoeba, and flies but also eukaryotes
share common cellular response signals to stressful conditions that can arise from the outside
but also from the inside. Moreover, extraordinary interplay between nucleus and subcellular
organelles, and between different organelles, like mitochondria and the endoplasmic reticulum
called mitochondria-associated endoplasmic reticulum membranes (MAMs), are involved in aging
and human diseases like obesity, diabetes, inflammation, neurodegeneration, autoimmune diseases,
atherosclerosis, and cancer. Actually, we know that to hit abnormal proteostasis and lipid exchanges
in the endoplasmic reticulum is crucial to best guide effective therapies or discover new drugs. Indeed,
restoration or impairment of endoplasmic reticulum shape and function lead to cellular homeostasis
by autophagy or to final death generally by apoptosis or pyroptosis. This Special Issue collects current
valuable articles or reviews on cellular stress research and each contribution opens a new window
for further studies and hypothesis. I hope that readers interested in this fascinating topic may be
stimulated to know more and more.