Articles

The mechanisms of stalled fork degradation in BRCA1/2-deficient cells remain unclear. UFL1, an UFM1-specific E3 ligase, was found to catalyze PTIP UFMylation at lysine 148, promoting stalled fork degradation by the MRE11 nuclease.

Developing disease-modifying drugs for neurodegenerative diseases has been very challenging. Now a machine learning approach has been used to identify small molecule inhibitors of α-synuclein aggregation, a process implicated in Parkinson’s disease and other synucleinopathies. Compounds that bind to the catalytic sites on the surface of the aggregates were identified and then progressively optimized into secondary nucleation inhibitors.

Through rational engineering of A3A deaminase, Yang and colleagues have designed CBEs termed haA3A-CBEs, which feature a condensed editing window and minimal off-target effects that are independent of defined sequence contexts and methylation status.

TERT was dephosphorylated by the protein phosphatase activity of the gluconeogenic enzyme FBP1, leading to inhibition of TERT nuclear translocation and telomere function. Lipid nanoparticle-delivered FBP1 mRNA blunts tumor growth in mice.

A proteomics and computational approach was developed to map the proximal proteome of the activated μ-opioid receptor and to extract subcellular location, trafficking and functional partners of G-protein-coupled receptor activity.

Exportin-1 (XPO1) was identified as the target of small molecules suppressing T cell activation. Selective disruption of the chromatin scaffolding function of XPO1 without blocking nuclear export implicates XPO1 as a target in autoimmunity.

Wenzell et al. developed a massively parallel screening platform to interrogate the sensitivity of signal peptides (SPs) to Sec61 inhibitors. The platform revealed how distinct inhibitors achieve sequence-dependent SP discrimination.

Huang et al. developed E3-substrate tagging by ubiquitin biotinylation (E-STUB), a proximity labeling-based method for direct identification of ubiquitylated substrates for a given E3 ligase, providing a useful tool for substrate discovery of targeted protein degradation and the understanding of E3 ligase function.

Hypoxia induces ·NO-dependent hydrogen sulfide (H₂S) biogenesis by inhibiting the transsulfuration pathway. H₂S oxidation promotes endothelial cell proliferation to support neovascularization in tissue injury and tumor xenograft models.

An approach to design proteins that can capture amyloidogenic protein regions present in, for example, tau and Aβ42 has now been developed. These designer proteins can inhibit the formation of pathogenic amyloid fibrils and protect cells from toxic species.

A method called MEDUSA was developed for identifying death regulatory genes in chemo-genetic profiling data, which enables characterization of a previously unappreciated mechanism of death induced by DNA damage in p53-deficient cells.

The study demonstrates that specific recognition and custom binding geometries can be computationally encoded between protein spans within lipids through designing synthetic transmembrane proteins to functionally regulate a target cytokine receptor.

NMR and Raman spectroscopies pinpoint the role of the protein droplet surface and RNA in the liquid droplet maturation mechanism of the FUS protein. A crust-like β-sheet structure is formed on the surface of FUS droplets during aging.

Yang et al. reported the development of nongenetically engineered artificial mechanoreceptors capable of reprogramming non-mechanoresponsive receptors to sense user-defined force cues, enabling de novo-designed mechanotransduction.

Aerobic glycolysis is a hallmark of fast-growing cells, but it is unclear whether glycolysis was selected for its speed. Glycolysis produces ATP slower than respiration (per protein mass) and is beneficial for rendering cells robust to hypoxia.

Development of a malolactone electrophile that contains sufficient ring strain to counteract the weak nucleophilicity of aspartate enables covalent targeting of K-Ras-G12D, which is commonly found in pancreatic cancers.

A proteome-wide thermal profiling study of osmolyte action on E. coli and human proteins within the cellular milieu reveals mechanisms of protein thermal stabilization by osmolytes and in situ behavior of intrinsically disordered proteins.

Structural, functional and computational studies uncover the molecular details of antiviral drug recognition and membrane translocation by a concentrative nucleoside transporter.

Adipose triglyceride lipase (ATGL), an enzyme in fatty acid metabolism, was identified as a negative regulator of the noncanonical inflammasome. ATGL binds to lipopolysaccharide and catalyzes the hydrolysis of fatty acid side chains blocking inflammasome activation.

A chemoproteomic method was developed that enables the global discovery of metal-binding proteins (MBPs) in proteomes, where the thermal stability of MBPs is perturbed by metal chelators. This tool, called METAL-TPP, is used to discover MBP candidates in the human proteome and provides a valuable method for functional annotation of MBPs in cell biology.