※ PEK family introduction

    PEK family is composed of four kinase members, which are eukaryotic translation initiation factor 2-alpha kinase. Family member EIF2AK1 can inhibits protein synthesis at the translation initiation level, in response to various stress conditions, including oxidative stress, heme deficiency, osmotic shock and heat shock. EIF2AK1 can exert its function through the phosphorylation of EIF2S1 at 'Ser-48' and 'Ser-51', thus preventing its recycling (1). EIF2AK2 can becomes autophosphorylated and can catalyze the phosphorylation of the translation initiation factor EIF2S1 following activation by double-stranded RNA in the presence of ATP (2). EIF2AK3 can phosphorylates the alpha subunit of eukaryotic translation-initiation factor 2 (EIF2), leading to its inactivation and thus to a rapid reduction of translational initiation and repression of global protein synthesis (3).

Reference
1. UniProt Annotation:   E2AK1_HUMAN;
2. UniProt Annotation:   E2AK2_HUMAN;
3. UniProt Annotation:   E2AK3_HUMAN;