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In biology, a mechanism is a system of causally interacting parts and processes that produce one or more effects. [1] Phenomena can be explained by describing their mechanisms. For example, natural selection is a mechanism of evolution; other mechanisms of evolution include genetic drift, mutation, and gene flow.
This differs from a mechanism of action since it is a more specific term that focuses on the interaction between the drug itself and an enzyme or receptor and its particular form of interaction, whether through inhibition, activation, agonism, or antagonism. Furthermore, the term "mechanism of action" is the main term that is primarily used in ...
Mechanism may refer to: Mechanism (economics), a set of rules for a game designed to achieve a certain outcome. Mechanism design, the study of such mechanisms; Mechanism (engineering), rigid bodies connected by joints in order to accomplish a desired force and/or motion transmission; Mechanism (biology), explaining how a feature is created
Pathology is the medical discipline that describes conditions typically observed during a disease state, whereas physiology is the biological discipline that describes processes or mechanisms operating within an organism. Pathology describes the abnormal or undesired condition (symptoms of a disease), whereas pathophysiology seeks to explain ...
A mechanism is usually a piece of a larger process, known as a mechanical system or machine. Sometimes an entire machine may be referred to as a mechanism; examples are the steering mechanism in a car, or the winding mechanism of a wristwatch. However, typically, a set of multiple mechanisms is called a machine.
Regulation of gene expression by a hormone receptor Diagram showing at which stages in the DNA-mRNA-protein pathway expression can be controlled. Regulation of gene expression, or gene regulation, [1] includes a wide range of mechanisms that are used by cells to increase or decrease the production of specific gene products (protein or RNA).
A mechanism of action of a chemical could be "binding to DNA" while its broader mode of action would be "transcriptional regulation". [3] However, there is no clear consensus and the term mode of action is also often used, especially in the study of pesticides, to describe molecular mechanisms such as action on specific nuclear receptors or ...
This is an example of a locally acting (negative feedback) mechanism. An example of upregulation is the response of liver cells exposed to such xenobiotic molecules as dioxin . In this situation, the cells increase their production of cytochrome P450 enzymes , which in turn increases degradation of these dioxin molecules.