Toso as a target for drug screening

A method for screening for a bioactive agent capable of modulating the activity of a Toso cell-surface receptor, said method comprising the steps of:

• a) adding a candidate bioactive agent to a cell comprising a recombinant nucleic acid encoding a Toso cell-surface receptor, wherein said recombinant nucleic acid will hybridize under high stringency conditions to the nucleic acid sequence depicted in FIG. 1 (SEQ ID NO:1) or its complement;
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• b) exposing said cell to an apoptotic agent that will induce apoptosis;
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• c) determining the effect of the candidate bioactive agent on apoptosis.