The potential role of PAX5 and PAX8 in regulating telomerase activity: a narrative mini-review

The ability to express replicative immortality is one of the hallmarks of cancer. Most of these cells attain this feature by expressing the enzyme telomerase. This enzyme is responsible for maintaining the telomeres, a repeating structure at the ends of chromosomes, protecting the chromosomes from degradation. The Paired Box (PAX) genes are a family of highly conserved genes involved in various functions, including the development of diseases like cancer, in which most of them express telomerase as the mechanism to maintain telomere length. This study seeks to investigate PAX genes as potential telomerase activators and explore emerging research areas. Related literature was retrieved from PubMed, Web of Science and Scopus databases using a keyword search, where 119 records were identified. However, upon further filtering, only four reports were relevant to this topic, which addresses the role of PAX5 and PAX8 genes and their proteins' role in telomerase regulation. More studies are needed to elucidate the complex mechanism of action between the PAX genes and telomerase regulation.