scholarly journals An Update on Thiol Signaling: S-Nitrosothiols, Hydrogen Sulfide and a Putative Role for Thionitrous Acid

Antioxidants ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 225 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nadzeya Marozkina ◽  
Benjamin Gaston

Long considered vital to antioxidant defenses, thiol chemistry has more recently been recognized to be of fundamental importance to cell signaling. S-nitrosothiols—such as S-nitrosoglutathione (GSNO)—and hydrogen sulfide (H2S) are physiologic signaling thiols that are regulated enzymatically. Current evidence suggests that they modify target protein function primarily through post-translational modifications. GSNO is made by NOS and other metalloproteins; H2S by metabolism of cysteine, homocysteine and cystathionine precursors. GSNO generally acts independently of NO generation and has a variety of gene regulatory, immune modulator, vascular, respiratory and neuronal effects. Some of this physiology is shared with H2S, though the mechanisms differ. Recent evidence also suggests that molecules resulting from reactions between GSNO and H2S, such as thionitrous acid (HSNO), could also have a role in physiology. Taken together, these data suggest important new potential targets for thiol-based drug development.

2020 ◽  
Vol 477 (7) ◽  
pp. 1219-1225 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nikolai N. Sluchanko

Many major protein–protein interaction networks are maintained by ‘hub’ proteins with multiple binding partners, where interactions are often facilitated by intrinsically disordered protein regions that undergo post-translational modifications, such as phosphorylation. Phosphorylation can directly affect protein function and control recognition by proteins that ‘read’ the phosphorylation code, re-wiring the interactome. The eukaryotic 14-3-3 proteins recognizing multiple phosphoproteins nicely exemplify these concepts. Although recent studies established the biochemical and structural basis for the interaction of the 14-3-3 dimers with several phosphorylated clients, understanding their assembly with partners phosphorylated at multiple sites represents a challenge. Suboptimal sequence context around the phosphorylated residue may reduce binding affinity, resulting in quantitative differences for distinct phosphorylation sites, making hierarchy and priority in their binding rather uncertain. Recently, Stevers et al. [Biochemical Journal (2017) 474: 1273–1287] undertook a remarkable attempt to untangle the mechanism of 14-3-3 dimer binding to leucine-rich repeat kinase 2 (LRRK2) that contains multiple candidate 14-3-3-binding sites and is mutated in Parkinson's disease. By using the protein-peptide binding approach, the authors systematically analyzed affinities for a set of LRRK2 phosphopeptides, alone or in combination, to a 14-3-3 protein and determined crystal structures for 14-3-3 complexes with selected phosphopeptides. This study addresses a long-standing question in the 14-3-3 biology, unearthing a range of important details that are relevant for understanding binding mechanisms of other polyvalent proteins.


2020 ◽  
Vol 64 (1) ◽  
pp. 135-153 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lauren Elizabeth Smith ◽  
Adelina Rogowska-Wrzesinska

Abstract Post-translational modifications (PTMs) are integral to the regulation of protein function, characterising their role in this process is vital to understanding how cells work in both healthy and diseased states. Mass spectrometry (MS) facilitates the mass determination and sequencing of peptides, and thereby also the detection of site-specific PTMs. However, numerous challenges in this field continue to persist. The diverse chemical properties, low abundance, labile nature and instability of many PTMs, in combination with the more practical issues of compatibility with MS and bioinformatics challenges, contribute to the arduous nature of their analysis. In this review, we present an overview of the established MS-based approaches for analysing PTMs and the common complications associated with their investigation, including examples of specific challenges focusing on phosphorylation, lysine acetylation and redox modifications.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
P. K. Rout ◽  
M. Verma

AbstractGoat milk is a source of nutrition in difficult areas and has lesser allerginicity than cow milk. It is leading in the area for nutraceutical formulation and drug development using goat mammary gland as a bioreactor. Post translational modifications of a protein regulate protein function, biological activity, stabilization and interactions. The protein variants of goat milk from 10 breeds were studied for the post translational modifications by combining highly sensitive 2DE and Q-Exactive LC-MS/MS. Here we observed high levels of post translational modifications in 201 peptides of 120 goat milk proteins. The phosphosites observed for CSN2, CSN1S1, CSN1S2, CSN3 were 11P, 13P, 17P and 6P, respectively in 105 casein phosphopeptides. Whey proteins BLG and LALBA showed 19 and 4 phosphosites respectively. Post translational modification was observed in 45 low abundant non-casein milk proteins mainly associated with signal transduction, immune system, developmental biology and metabolism pathways. Pasp is reported for the first time in 47 sites. The rare conserved peptide sequence of (SSSEE) was observed in αS1 and αS2 casein. The functional roles of identified phosphopeptides included anti-microbial, DPP-IV inhibitory, anti-inflammatory and ACE inhibitory. This is first report from tropics, investigating post translational modifications in casein and non-casein goat milk proteins and studies their interactions.


1997 ◽  
Vol 139 (5) ◽  
pp. 1197-1207 ◽  
Author(s):  
N. Doane Chilcoat ◽  
Aaron P. Turkewitz

Phosphoglucomutase (PGM) is a ubiquitous highly conserved enzyme involved in carbohydrate metabolism. A number of recently discovered PGM-like proteins in a variety of organisms have been proposed to function in processes other than metabolism. In addition, sequence analysis suggests that several of these may lack PGM enzymatic activity. The best studied PGM-like protein is parafusin, a major phosphoprotein in the ciliate Paramecium tetraurelia that undergoes rapid and massive dephosphorylation when cells undergo synchronous exocytosis of their dense-core secretory granules. Indirect genetic and biochemical evidence also supports a role in regulated exocytotic membrane fusion. To examine this matter directly, we have identified and cloned the parafusin homologue in Tetrahymena thermophila, a ciliate in which protein function can be studied in vivo. The unique T. thermophila gene, called PGM1, encodes a protein that is closely related to parafusin by sequence and by characteristic post-translational modifications. Comparison of deduced protein sequences, taking advantage of the known atomic structure of rabbit muscle PGM, suggests that both ciliate enzymes and all other PGM-like proteins have PGM activity. We evaluated the activity and function of PGM1 through gene disruption. Surprisingly, ΔPGM1 cells displayed no detectable defect in exocytosis, but showed a dramatic decrease in PGM activity. Both our results, and reinterpretation of previous data, suggest that any potential role for PGM-like proteins in regulated exocytosis is unlikely to precede membrane fusion.


2021 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Flurina Boehi ◽  
Patrick Manetsch ◽  
Michael O. Hottiger

AbstractSignaling cascades provide integrative and interactive frameworks that allow the cell to respond to signals from its environment and/or from within the cell itself. The dynamic regulation of mammalian cell signaling pathways is often modulated by cascades of protein post-translational modifications (PTMs). ADP-ribosylation is a PTM that is catalyzed by ADP-ribosyltransferases and manifests as mono- (MARylation) or poly- (PARylation) ADP-ribosylation depending on the addition of one or multiple ADP-ribose units to protein substrates. ADP-ribosylation has recently emerged as an important cell regulator that impacts a plethora of cellular processes, including many intracellular signaling events. Here, we provide an overview of the interplay between the intracellular diphtheria toxin-like ADP-ribosyltransferase (ARTD) family members and five selected signaling pathways (including NF-κB, JAK/STAT, Wnt-β-catenin, MAPK, PI3K/AKT), which are frequently described to control or to be controlled by ADP-ribosyltransferases and how these interactions impact the cellular responses.


2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yanhui Hu ◽  
Richelle Sopko ◽  
Verena Chung ◽  
Romain A. Studer ◽  
Sean D. Landry ◽  
...  

AbstractPost-translational modification (PTM) serves as a regulatory mechanism for protein function, influencing stability, protein interactions, activity and localization, and is critical in many signaling pathways. The best characterized PTM is phosphorylation, whereby a phosphate is added to an acceptor residue, commonly serine, threonine and tyrosine. As proteins are often phosphorylated at multiple sites, identifying those sites that are important for function is a challenging problem. Considering that many phosphorylation sites may be non-functional, prioritizing evolutionarily conserved phosphosites provides a general strategy to identify the putative functional sites with regards to regulation and function. To facilitate the identification of conserved phosphosites, we generated a large-scale phosphoproteomics dataset from Drosophila embryos collected from six closely-related species. We built iProteinDB (https://www.flyrnai.org/tools/iproteindb/), a resource integrating these data with other high-throughput PTM datasets, including vertebrates, and manually curated information for Drosophila. At iProteinDB, scientists can view the PTM landscape for any Drosophila protein and identify predicted functional phosphosites based on a comparative analysis of data from closely-related Drosophila species. Further, iProteinDB enables comparison of PTM data from Drosophila to that of orthologous proteins from other model organisms, including human, mouse, rat, Xenopus laevis, Danio rerio, and Caenorhabditis elegans.


2019 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Yun Wei ◽  
Wan-Jie Yang ◽  
Qi-Jun Wang ◽  
Peng-Cheng Lin ◽  
Jian-Yuan Zhao ◽  
...  

Abstract Background Lysine post-translational modifications are important regulators of protein function. Proteomic and biochemical approaches have resulted in identification of several lysine modifications, including acetylation, crotonylation, and succinylation. Here, we developed an approach for surveying amide-bonded lysine modifications in the proteome of human tissues/cells based on the observation that many lysine modifications are amide-bonded and that the Salmonella enterica deacetylase, CobB, is an amidase. Results After the proteome of human tissues/cells was denatured and the non-covalently bonded metabolites were removed by acetone washes, and the amide-bonded modifiers were released by CobB and analyzed using liquid- and/or gas chromatography/mass spectrometry metabolomic analysis. This protocol, which required 3–4 days for completion, was used to qualitatively identify more than 40 documented and unreported lysine modifications from the human proteome and to quantitatively analyze dynamic changes in targeted amide-bonded lysine modifications. Conclusions We developed a method that was capable of monitoring and quantifying amide-bonded lysine modifications in cells of different origins.


2017 ◽  
Vol 398 (4) ◽  
pp. 425-440 ◽  
Author(s):  
Donna M. Small ◽  
Declan F. Doherty ◽  
Caoifa M. Dougan ◽  
Sinéad Weldon ◽  
Clifford C. Taggart

Abstract Members of the whey acidic protein (WAP) or WAP four-disulfide-core (WFDC) family of proteins are a relatively under-explored family of low molecular weight proteins. The two most prominent WFDC proteins, secretory leukocyte protease inhibitor (SLPI) and elafin (or the precursor, trappin-2), have been shown to possess multiple functions including anti-protease, anti-bacterial, anti-viral and anti-inflammatory properties. It is therefore of no surprise that both SLPI and elafin/trappin-2 have been developed as potential therapeutics. Given the abundance of SLPI and elafin/trappin-2 in the human lung, most work in the area of WFDC research has focused on the role of WFDC proteins in protecting the lung from proteolytic attack. In this review, we will outline the current evidence regarding the expanding role of WFDC protein function with a focus on WFDC activity in lung disease as well as emerging data regarding the function of some of the more recently described WFDC proteins.


2020 ◽  
Vol 2020 ◽  
pp. 1-20 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ana Paula Vargas Visentin ◽  
Rafael Colombo ◽  
Ellen Scotton ◽  
Débora Soligo Fracasso ◽  
Adriane Ribeiro da Rosa ◽  
...  

The prevalence of psychiatric disorders has increased in recent years. Among existing mental disorders, major depressive disorder (MDD) has emerged as one of the leading causes of disability worldwide, affecting individuals throughout their lives. Currently, MDD affects 15% of adults in the Americas. Over the past 50 years, pharmacotherapy, psychotherapy, and brain stimulation have been used to treat MDD. The most common approach is still pharmacotherapy; however, studies show that about 40% of patients are refractory to existing treatments. Although the monoamine hypothesis has been widely accepted as a molecular mechanism to explain the etiology of depression, its relationship with other biochemical phenomena remains only partially understood. This is the case of the link between MDD and inflammation, mitochondrial dysfunction, and oxidative stress. Studies have found that depressive patients usually exhibit altered inflammatory markers, mitochondrial membrane depolarization, oxidized mitochondrial DNA, and thus high levels of both central and peripheral reactive oxygen species (ROS). The effect of antidepressants on these events remains unclear. Nevertheless, the effects of ROS on the brain are well known, including lipid peroxidation of neuronal membranes, accumulation of peroxidation products in neurons, protein and DNA damage, reduced antioxidant defenses, apoptosis induction, and neuroinflammation. Antioxidants such as ascorbic acid, tocopherols, and coenzyme Q have shown promise in some depressive patients, but without consensus on their efficacy. Hence, this paper provides a review of MDD and its association with inflammation, mitochondrial dysfunction, and oxidative stress and is aimed at thoroughly discussing the putative links between these events, which may contribute to the design and development of new therapeutic approaches for patients.


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