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Cellular signaling in higher organisms is a major topic in modern medical and pharmacological research and is of central importance in the biomolecular sciences. Accordingly, the book concentrates on signaling and regulation in animal systems and in man. Plant systems could not be considered, and results from lower eukaryotes and prokaryotes are only cited if they are of exemplary character. The enormous increase in data on signal transduction has led me to leave out the chapter on ion channels and nerve signaling found in the former editions. This topic has since evolved into a huge research area of its own that could not be considered adequately within this book. Signaling processes can be described nowadays more and more on a molecular level and structure-function relationships of many central signaling proteins have been worked out. Research on signal transduction is presently focused on the characterization of the distinct cellular functions of the huge number of different signaling proteins and their subspecies, on the supramolecular organization of signaling proteins and on the interplay between different signaling pathways. The enormous complexity of signaling systems revealed by these studies makes it increasingly difficult to write a book that provides a truly comprehensive overview on signal transduction and considers all of the major new achievements. In consequence, not all branches and fields of signal transduction could be treated here with the same thoroughness.the aim of the present book to describe the structural and biochemical properties of signalingmolecules and their regulation, the interaction of signaling proteins at the various levels of signal transduction and to work out the basic principles of cellular communication. Chapters in this books are The Regulation of Gene Expression; The Regulation of Enzyme Activity; Structure and Function of Signal Pathways; Signaling by Nuclear Receptors; G Protein-Coupled Signal Transmission Pathways;Intracellular Messenger Substances: Second Messengers; Ser/Thr-specific Protein Kinases and Protein Phosphatases; Signal Transmission via Transmembrane Receptors with Tyrosine-Specific Protein Kinase Activity; Signal Transmission via Ras Proteins; Intracellular Signal Transduction: the Protein Cascades of the MAP Kinase Pathways; Membrane Receptors with Associated Tyrosine Kinase Activity; Other Receptor Classes;Regulation of the Cell Cycle;Malfunction of Signaling Pathways and Tumorigenesis: Oncogenes and Tumor Suppressor Genes;and Apoptosis.