Editing Programmed cell death (section)

==In slime molds==
The social [[Slime mould|slime mold]] ''[[Dictyostelium discoideum]]'' has the peculiarity of either adopting a predatory [[amoeboid|amoeba]]-like behavior in its [[Microorganism|unicellular]] form or coalescing into a mobile [[slug]]-like form when dispersing the [[spore]]s that will give birth to the next [[generation]].<ref>
{{cite journal
 |vauthors=Crespi B, Springer S |year = 2003
 |title = Ecology. Social slime molds meet their match
 |journal = [[Science (journal)|Science]]
 |volume = 299 |issue = 5603 |pages = 56–7
 |pmid = 12511635
 |doi = 10.1126/science.1080776
|s2cid = 83917994
 }}</ref>

The stalk is composed of dead cells that have undergone a type of PCD that shares many features of an autophagic cell-death: massive vacuoles forming inside cells, a degree of [[chromatin]] condensation, but no [[Restriction digest|DNA fragmentation]].<ref>
{{cite journal
 |vauthors=Levraud JP, Adam M, Luciani MF, de Chastellier C, Blanton RL, Golstein P |year = 2003
 |title = Dictyostelium cell death: early emergence and demise of highly polarized paddle cells
 |journal = [[Journal of Cell Biology]]
 |volume = 160 | issue = 7 | pages = 1105–14
 |pmid = 12654899
 |pmc = 2172757
 |doi = 10.1083/jcb.200212104
}}</ref> The structural role of the residues left by the dead cells is reminiscent of the products of PCD in plant tissue.{{cn|date=November 2024}}

''D. discoideum'' is a slime mold, part of a branch that might have emerged from [[Eukaryote|eukaryotic]] ancestors about a [[Timeline of evolution|billion years]] before the present. It seems that they emerged after the ancestors of [[Viridiplantae|green plants]] and the ancestors of [[fungi]] and animals had differentiated. But, in addition to their place in the evolutionary [[Phylogenetic tree|tree]], the fact that PCD has been observed in the humble, simple, six-[[chromosome]] ''D. discoideum'' has additional significance: It permits the study of a developmental PCD path that does not depend on caspases characteristic of apoptosis.<ref>
{{cite journal
 |vauthors=Roisin-Bouffay C, Luciani MF, Klein G, Levraud JP, Adam M, Golstein P |year = 2004
 |title = Developmental cell death in dictyostelium does not require paracaspase
 |journal = [[Journal of Biological Chemistry]]
 |volume = 279 | issue = 12 | pages = 11489–94
 |pmid = 14681218
 |doi = 10.1074/jbc.M312741200
|doi-access = free
 }}</ref>