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Abstract
Phosphatases play key roles in normal physiology and diseases. Studying phosphatases
has been both essential and challenging, and the application of conventional genetic
and biochemical methods has led to crucial but still limited understanding of their
mechanisms, substrates, and exclusive functions within highly intricate networks.
With the advances in technologies such as cellular imaging and molecular and chemical
biology in terms of sensitive tools and methods, the phosphatase field has thrived
in the past years and has set new insights for cell signaling studies and for therapeutic
development. In this review, we give an overview of the existing interdisciplinary
tools for phosphatases, give examples on how they have been applied to increase our
understanding of these enzymes, and suggest how they-and other tools yet barely used
in the phosphatase field-might be adapted to address future questions and challenges.