Scientists make rare discovery of a protein function universal to bacteria and humans OhioState PNASNews
The finding could lead to enhancements of drugs derived from the amino acid GABA, but also has evolutionary implications: It adds to the sparse evidence suggesting there are commonalities betweenand humans with respect to sensing the presence of essential components of life, such as oxygen and food.
"For the first time, we've found the universal way of detecting amino acids. Nearly every organism can do it through this mechanism," said Igor Jouline, senior author of the study and a professor of microbiology at The Ohio State University. In earlier studies of a bacterium that causes human infection, Jouline's lab and collaborators in Spain found several receptors that recognized amino acids, and identified a structural feature that all of those proteins shared.
That protein, it turns out, is the one the research team found in humans that contains the motif enabling detection ofCollaborators in the United Kingdom helped confirm this finding, testing the effects of mutating the motif in experiments using a rat protein that functions in exactly the same way as the human protein. Altering the motif changed the function of the entire receptor, preventing the GABA-derived drug gabapentin from making an effective connection.
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