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Defensins are basic, cysteine-rich antimicrobial peptides that are important components of plant defense against pathogens. Previously, we isolated a defensin, Pv D1, from Phaseolus vulgaris L. (common bean) seed...
Calciotropic hormones were thought to facilitate calcium transfer through active transcellular or passive paracellular pathway for calcium homeostasis. While calcium transport proteins such as CaBP-28 k, TRPV5...
Carbohydrate-deficient transferrin (CDT) is a widely used alcohol biomarker. Because of the high prevalence of chronic alcohol abuse in many countries, CDT plays an important role in the areas of traffic, clin...
Autophagy is a cellular response to intracellular pathogens including mycobacteria and is induced by the direct inhibitors of mammalian target of Rapamycin (mTOR), a major negative regulator of autophagy. Auto...
Endoplasmic reticulum stress, caused by the presence of misfolded proteins, activates the stress sensor inositol-requiring enzyme 1α (IRE1α). The resulting increase in IRE1α RNase activity causes sequence-spec...
We have previously shown that the P. gingivalis HmuY hemophore-like protein binds heme and scavenges heme from host hemoproteins to further deliver it to the cognate heme receptor HmuR. The aim of this study was ...
The editors of BMC Biochemistry would like to thank all our reviewers who have contributed their time to the journal in Volume 14 (2013).
The regulation of lipid biosynthesis is essential in photosynthetic eukaryotic cells. This regulation occurs during the direct synthesis of fatty acids and triacylglycerols (TAGs), as well as during other cont...
Heterotrimeric G-proteins relay extracellular signals to intracellular effector proteins. Multiple methods have been developed to monitor their activity; including labeled nucleotides and biosensors based on g...
Dihydroorotase (DHO) is a zinc metalloenzyme, although the number of active site zinc ions has been controversial. E. coli DHO was initially thought to have a mononuclear metal center, but the subsequent X-ray st...
Peroxidases are emerging as an important class of enzymes that can be used for the efficient degradation of organic pollutants. However, detailed studies identifying the various intermediates produced and the ...
Huntington’s disease (HD) is a monogenic disorder caused by an aberrant expansion of CAG repeats in the huntingtin gene (HTT). Pathogenesis is associated with expression of the mutant (mHTT) protein in the CNS, w...
Fragile X Syndrome (FXS), the most common inherited form of mental retardation, is caused by expansion of a CGG/CCG repeat tract in the 5′-untranslated region of the fragile X mental retardation (FMR1) gene, whic...
Proteases are important enzymes involved in numerous essential physiological processes and hold a strong potential for industrial applications. The proteolytic activity of insects’ gut is endowed by many isofo...
Alpha-1 proteinase inhibitor (API) is a plasma serpin superfamily member that inhibits neutrophil elastase; variant API M358R inhibits thrombin and activated protein C (APC). Fusing residues 1-75 of another se...
In vertebrates, bile salts are primarily synthesized in the liver and secreted into the intestine where they aid in absorption of dietary fats. Small amounts of bile salts that are not reabsorbed into enterohe...
YedY, a molybdoenzyme belonging to the sulfite oxidase family, is found in most Gram-negative bacteria. It contains a twin-arginine signal sequence that is cleaved after its translocation into the periplasm. D...
BTBD10 binds to Akt and protein phosphatase 2A (PP2A) and inhibits the PP2A-mediated dephosphorylation of Akt, thereby keeping Akt activated. Previous studies have suggested that BTBD10 plays an important role...
Methylmalonyl-CoA mutase (MCM) is an adenosylcobalamin-dependent enzyme that catalyses the interconversion of (2R)-methylmalonyl-CoA to succinyl-CoA. In humans, a deficit in activity of MCM, due to an impairme...
Vitamin C (ascorbic acid) is an essential nutrient of most living tissues that readily acts as a strong reducing agent, which is abundant in fruits and vegetables. Although, it inhibits cell growth in many hum...
Streptomyces sp. N174 chitosanase (CsnN174), a member of glycoside hydrolases family 46, is one of the most extensively studied chitosanases. Previous studies allowed identifying several key residues of this inve...
Vesicle fusion is an essential process for maintaining the structure and function of the endomembrane system. Fusion is mediated by t-SNARE (soluble N-ethylmaleimide-sensitive factor attachment protein receptor) ...
Transforming growth factor-betas (TGF-βs), including beta2 (TGF-β2), constitute a superfamily of multifunctional cytokines with important implications in morphogenesis, cell differentiation and tissue remodeli...
Studies have shown that inflammation promoted atherosclerotic progression; however, it remains unclear whether inflammation promoted atherosclerotic progression properties by altering cholesterol metabolism in...
The cytochrome P450s are monooxygenases that insert oxygen functionalities into a wide variety of organic substrates with high selectivity. There is interest in developing efficient catalysts based on the “per...
Lamins A and C, two major structural components of the nuclear lamina that determine nuclear shape and size, are phosphoproteins. Phosphorylation of lamin A/C is cell cycle-dependent and is involved in regulat...
Hydroxysteroid (17beta) dehydrogenase X (HSD10) is a multifunctional protein encoded by the HSD17B10 gene at Xp11.2. In response to stress or hypoxia-ischemia its levels increase rapidly. Expression of this gene ...
Signal peptide peptidase (SPP) is a multi-transmembrane aspartic protease involved in intramembrane-regulated proteolysis (RIP). RIP proteases mediate various key life events by releasing bioactive peptides fr...
α-Dystroglycan (α-DG) is heavily glycosylated within its central mucin-like domain. The glycosylation shell of α-dystroglycan is known to largely influence its functional properties toward extracellular ligand...
Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) —aspirin, naproxen, nimesulide, and piroxicam— lowered activation of type II cAMP-dependent protein kinase A (PKA-II) in isolated rat adipocytes, decreasing adren...
The improvement of biomedical properties, e.g. biocompatibility, of poly(3-hydroxyalkanoates) (PHAs) by copolymerization is a promising trend in bioengineering. We used strain Azotobacter chroococcum 7B, an effec...
The archeaon Sulfolobus solfataricus P2 encodes a thermoacidophilic cellulase which shows an extreme acid and thermal stability with a pH optimum at 1.8 and a temperature optimum at 80°C. This extraordinary enzym...
The androgen receptor (AR) is a member of the nuclear receptor (NR) superfamily of ligand-inducible DNA transcription factors, and is the major mediator of male sexual development, prostate growth and the path...
Analysis of factors contributing to high affinity antibody-protein interactions provides insight into natural antibody evolution, and guides the design of antibodies with new or enhanced function. We previousl...
The editors of BMC Biochemistry would like to thank all of our reviewers who have contributed to the journal in volume 13 (2012).
Conjugation of the ubiquitin-like modifier Nedd8 to cullins is critical for the function of SCF-type ubiquitin ligases and thus facilitates ubiquitin conjugation and ultimately degradation of SCF substrates, i...
Heparin cofactor II (HCII) is a circulating protease inhibitor, one which contains an N-terminal acidic extension (HCII 1-75) unique within the serpin superfamily. Deletion of HCII 1-75 greatly reduces the abi...
The hetero-hexamer of the eukaryotic minichromosome maintenance (MCM) proteins plays an essential role in replication of genomic DNA. The ring-shaped Mcm2-7 hexamers comprising one of each subunit show helicas...
Receptor tyrosine kinases (RTKs) are crucial components of signal transduction systems in multicellular animals. Surprisingly, numerous RTKs have been identified in the genomes of unicellular choanoflagellates...
There is extensive evidence for the interaction of metabolic enzymes with the eukaryotic cytoskeleton. The significance of these interactions is far from clear.
Hepatoma-derived growth factor (HDGF) is a protein which is highly expressed in a variety of tumours. HDGF has mitogenic, angiogenic, neurotrophic and antiapoptotic activity but the molecular mechanisms by whi...
The ubiquitin ligase COP1, COnstitutively Photomorphogenic 1, functions in many biological responses in mammalian cells, but its downstream pathway remains unclear.
The α-isoform of the Type 1A Phosphoinositide 3-kinases (PI3Kα) has protein kinase activity as well as phosphoinositide lipid kinase activity. The best described substrate for its protein kinase activity is it...
An important controversy in the relationship between beef tenderness and muscle characteristics including biochemical traits exists among meat researchers. The aim of this study is to explain variability in me...
Presenilin-1 (PS1) is a transmembrane protein first discovered because of its association with familial Alzheimer’s disease. Mice with null mutations in PS1 die shortly after birth exhibiting multiple CNS and ...
Ca2+/calmodulin-dependent protein kinase kinase (CaMKK) phosphorylates and activates particular downstream protein kinases — including CaMKI, CaMKIV, and AMPK— to stimulate multiple Ca2+-signal transduction pathw...
Plant sucrose uptake transporters (SUTs) are H+/sucrose symporters related to the major facilitator superfamily (MFS). SUTs are essential for plant growth but little is known about their transport mechanism. Rece...