Oliver's mTOR Atlas Evidence Platform
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Pathway link 4EBP1-EIF4E

4E-BP1 eIF4E

4E-BP1 inhibits eIF4E.

Untagged 4E-BP1 clamps onto eIF4E and blocks it; mTORC1 tags 4E-BP1 to make it let go – releasing a brake, not pressing an accelerator.

Unphosphorylated 4E-BP1 clamps onto eIF4E and stops it assembling the cap-binding complex. mTORC1 phosphorylates 4E-BP1 to release that grip - so the brake on translation is released, not the accelerator pressed.

The conditions it holds under

Biochemical and cell-culture evidence (in vitro assays, mammalian and mouse cells, plus one review). It establishes the binding switch itself. It does not measure how much translation changes in a given tissue, in whole animals or in people.

Time it takes
seconds
Step
direct (one molecule acts on the other)
Measured in
mammalian cells
Where in the cell
cytosol
Reaches people?
plausible in people, not shown directly
How settled
settled in the literature

Studies behind it

YearEvidenceStudy
2009 R Molecular mechanisms of mTOR-mediated translational controlMAX2009 Review of the molecular mechanisms of mTOR-mediated translational control.
2012 M A unifying model for mTORC1-mediated regulation of mRNA translationTHO2012 Used ribosome profiling with the complete inhibitor Torin1 to address a long-standing debate: in these cells, mTORC1's translational control runs largely through the 4E-BP family acting on a specific class of mRNAs (TOP motifs). Losing just the 4E-BPs makes translation of TOP mRNAs resistant to mTOR inhibition - naming them the master effectors.
2003 M TOS motif-mediated raptor binding regulates 4E-BP1 multisite phosphorylation and functionSCH2003 The TOS motif mediates raptor binding and controls multisite 4E-BP1 phosphorylation by mTORC1.
2002 M Mammalian cell size is controlled by mTOR and its downstream targets S6K1 and 4EBP1/eIF4EFIN2002 mTOR controls mammalian cell size through its downstream translational targets S6K1 and 4E-BP1/eIF4E.

Points the other way

No study in the Atlas contradicts this link. That means none in this curated set, not none in the literature.

Who has checked this

Checked by
No researcher outside the project has checked this link yet.
Curator sign-off
Not signed off yet. This link was drafted with AI help and has not been reviewed link by link; treat it as a proposal until it is.
Curated by
Oliver Barton, with AI help for drafting; see how links are checked.

“Inhibits” describes the effect on the target's activity, not on how much of it there is.

“How settled” describes how far researchers in the field agree. It is not the same as the sign-off above, which only says whether a named curator has checked this page.

If this link rests on your own work: a click on “This looks right” below, or a short note through “Report an error”, helps us more than anything else on this page.

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