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Green fluorescent proteins are light-induced electron donors

Nature Chemical Biology volume 5, pages 459–461 (2009)Cite this article

Abstract

Proteins of the green fluorescent protein (GFP) family are well known owing to their unique biochemistry and extensive use as in vivo markers. We discovered that GFPs of diverse origins can act as light-induced electron donors in photochemical reactions with various electron acceptors, including biologically relevant ones. Moreover, via green-to-red GFP photoconversion, this process can be observed in living cells without additional treatment.

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Figure 1: Oxidant-mediated green-to-red photoconversion of EGFP in vitro.
Figure 2: Green-to-red photoconversion of GFPs in live cells.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the MCB program of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the Russian Federal Agency for Science and Innovations (grant 02.513.12.3013), Howard Hughes Medical Institute (grant 55005618), the European Commission Sixth Framework Programme (LSHG-CT-2003-503259), the Russian Foundation for Basic Research (grants 07-04-12189-ofi and 09-04-00356-a), and the program “State Support of the Leading Scientific Schools” (NS-2395.2008.4). D.M.C. and K.A.L. are supported by the Russian Science Support Foundation and by grants from the president of the Russian Federation (MK-6119.2008.4 and MD-5815.2008.4). V.V.V. was supported by grant GM073913 from the US National Institutes of Health.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Shemiakin-Ovchinnikov Institute of Bioorganic Chemistry, Moscow, Russia

    Alexey M Bogdanov, Alexander S Mishin, Ilia V Yampolsky, Vsevolod V Belousov, Dmitriy M Chudakov, Sergey Lukyanov & Konstantin A Lukyanov

  2. Department of Anatomy and Structural Biology, and Gruss-Lipper Biophotonics Center, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Bronx, New York, USA

    Fedor V Subach & Vladislav V Verkhusha

Authors
  1. Alexey M Bogdanov
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  2. Alexander S Mishin
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  4. Vsevolod V Belousov
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  5. Dmitriy M Chudakov
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  6. Fedor V Subach
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  7. Vladislav V Verkhusha
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  8. Sergey Lukyanov
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  9. Konstantin A Lukyanov
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Correspondence to Konstantin A Lukyanov.

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Supplementary Figures 1–4, Supplementary Tables 1 and 2, and Supplementary Methods (PDF 153 kb)

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Bogdanov, A., Mishin, A., Yampolsky, I. et al. Green fluorescent proteins are light-induced electron donors. Nat Chem Biol 5, 459–461 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1038/nchembio.174

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