Press-room / Digest
Start codon context and occurrence of AUG codons in the beginning of protein coding open reading frames co-evolve
Researchers from IBCh RAS together with their international collаborators discovered an evolutionary link between efficiency of start codons and the probability of AUG codon occurrence in the 5'-end parts of protein-coding sequences. When start codons are inefficient the next AUG codon is more likely to be found in the same reading frame. At the same time in case of highly efficient start codons, the next AUG codon is more likely to be found in alternative frames. They also have shown that weak initiation at the first starts is associated with the synthesis of shortened proteoforms as a result of initiation at the second starts. The study was published in the journal Genome Research. Learn more
New technology promises to revolutionize nanomedicine
A collaboration of scientists from the Shemyakin-Ovchinnikov Institute of Bioorganic Chemistry, the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology and Prokhorov General Physics Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences have developed a breakthrough technology to resolve a key problem that has prevented the introduction of novel drugs into clinical practice for decades. The new solution prolongs blood circulation for virtually any nanomedicine, boosting its therapeutic efficiency. The study was published in Nature Biomedical Engineering and featured in the journal’s News & Views section. Learn more
A kinase bioscavenger provides antibiotic resistance by extremely tight substrate binding
Kinase-mediated phosphorylation represents one of the general strategies for the emergence of antibiotic resistance. Scientists from the Laboratory of biocatalysis reported a unique bioscavenging kinase AmiN, member of a new subfamily of AmiN-like kinases, isolated from the Siberian bear microbiome, inactivates antibiotic amicoumacin by phosphorylation. The nanomolar substrate affinity defines AmiN as a phosphotransferase with a unique catalytic efficiency proximal to the diffusion limit. Crystallographic analysis and multiscale simulations revealed a catalytically perfect mechanism providing phosphorylation exclusively in the case of a closed active site that counteracts substrate promiscuity. AmiN kinase is a member of the previously unknown subfamily representing the first evidence of a specialized phosphotransferase bioscavenger. The work is published in Science Advances.
Transgenic aspen plants (Populus tremula) with the expression of recombinant xyloglucanase sp-Xeg show an increased growth rate, altered composition and properties of wood, and the phenotype of the plant as a whole
Wood formation is an extremely complex process, controlled by more than 40,000 genes.At the cellular level, wood is nothing but lignified cell walls that constructed from three main structural biopolymers - cellulose, hemicellulose and lignins. The main component of hemicellulose is xyloglucans, which form short cross-links between long cellulose filaments. The more stitches, the lower the elasticity of the cell wall. Scientists from the Group of Forest Biotechnology together with russian and foreign colleages suggested that partial, rather than excessive, hydrolysis of xyloglucans may affect the elasticity of the cell wall, and indirectly the growth rate of the tree. In transgenic models of aspen, they have shown that superexpression of recombinant xyloglucanase from the fungus P.canescens leads not only to hydrolysis of cell wall xyloglucans, but also is accompanied by a complex of changes in the phenotype: the content of cellulose in wood is increased, the carbohydrate composition of wood are changed, as a result, the wood began to decompose more slowly. The work is published in BMC Plant Biology. Learn more
Structure of Supramers Formed by the Amphiphile Biotin‐CMG‐DOPE
Scientists from the Department of Chemical Biology of Glycans and Lipids, the Department of structural biology and the Department of Biomaterials and Bionanotechnology IBCh RAS in collaboration with Russian and foreign colleges published a paper in ChemistryOpen on the study of conjugate of a biotin with DOPE (dioleoylphosphatidyl ethanolamine) through a nontrivial spacer, CMG (made from oligoglycine, some of glycines are carboxymethylated). biot-CMG-DOPE remarkably integrates into living cells, and in seconds (by simple contact) it covers almost any surface - and this has become a universal way of biotinylation. The work sheds light on the supramolecular organization of biot-CMG-DOPE molecule as part of the cell membrane and the mechanism of its interaction with streptavidin. Learn more