Regulatory recruitment of signalling molecules to the cell membrane by pleckstrinhomology domains

Pleckstrin-homology (PH) domains are small protein modules found in more than 100 proteins, most of which require association with the cell membrane to mediate their biological functions. Recent studies have demonstrated that some PH domains bind specifically to phosphoinositides, and that PH-domain-mediated recruitment of certain proteins to the cell membrane is important in regulation of their activities or functions. This provides the cell with a simple and efficient mechanism for linking growth-factor-induced changes in the levels of specific membrane phosphoinositides with other signalling pathways that control diverse processes such as protein synthesis, DNA synthesis and cell adhesion.