| 1. |
- Blockhuys, Stephanie, 1983, et al.
(author)
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Defining the human copper proteome and analysis of its expression variation in cancers.
- 2017
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In: Metallomics. - : Oxford University Press (OUP). - 1756-5901 .- 1756-591X. ; 9:2, s. 112-123
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Copper (Cu) is essential for living organisms, and acts as a cofactor in many metabolic enzymes. To avoid the toxicity of free Cu, organisms have specific transport systems that 'chaperone' the metal to targets. Cancer progression is associated with increased cellular Cu concentrations, whereby proliferative immortality, angiogenesis and metastasis are cancer hallmarks with defined requirements for Cu. The aim of this study is to gather all known Cu-binding proteins and reveal their putative involvement in cancers using the available database resources of RNA transcript levels. Using the database along with manual curation, we identified a total of 54 Cu-binding proteins (named the human Cu proteome). Next, we retrieved RNA expression levels in cancer versus normal tissues from the TCGA database for the human Cu proteome in 18 cancer types, and noted an intricate pattern of up- and downregulation of the genes in different cancers. Hierarchical clustering in combination with bioinformatics and functional genomics analyses allowed for the prediction of cancer-related Cu-binding proteins; these were specifically inspected for the breast cancer data. Finally, for the Cu chaperone ATOX1, which is the only Cu-binding protein proposed to have transcription factor activities, we validated its predicted over-expression in patient breast cancer tissue at the protein level. This collection of Cu-binding proteins, with RNA expression patterns in different cancers, will serve as an excellent resource for mechanistic-molecular studies of Cu-dependent processes in cancer.
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| 2. |
- Feizi, Neda, et al.
(author)
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Autophagy induction regulates influenza virus replication in a time-dependent manner
- 2017
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In: Journal of Medical Microbiology. - : Microbiology Society. - 0022-2615 .- 1473-5644. ; 66:4, s. 536-541
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Purpose. Autophagy plays a key role in host defence responses against microbial infections by promoting degradation of pathogens and participating in acquired immunity. The interaction between autophagy and viruses is complex, and this pathway is hijacked by several viruses. Influenza virus (IV) interferes with autophagy through its replication and increases the accumulation of autophagosomes by blocking lysosome fusion. Thus, autophagy could be an effective area for antiviral research. Methodology. In this study, we evaluated the effect of autophagy on IV replication. Two cell lines were transfected with Beclin-1 expression plasmid before (prophylactic approach) and after (therapeutic approach) IV inoculation. Results/Key findings. Beclin-1 overexpression in the cells infected by virus induced autophagy to 26 %. The log10 haemagglutinin titre and TCID50 (tissue culture infective dose giving 50% infection) of replicating virus were measured at 24 and 48 h post-infection. In the prophylactic approach, the virus titre was enhanced significantly at 24 h post-infection (P?0.01), but it was not significantly different from the control at 48 h post-infection. In contrast, the therapeutic approach of autophagy induction inhibited the virus replication at 24 and 48 h post-infection. Additionally, we showed that inhibition of autophagy using 3-methyladenine reduced viral replication. Conclusion. This study revealed that the virus (H1N1) titre was controlled in a time-dependent manner following autophagy induction in host cells. Manipulation of autophagy during the IV life cycle can be targeted both for antiviral aims and for increasing viral yield for virus production.
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| 3. |
- Feizi, Amir, 1980, et al.
(author)
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Human protein secretory pathway genes are expressed in a tissue-specific pattern to match processing demands of the secretome
- 2017
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In: npj Systems Biology and Applications. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 2056-7189. ; 3:1
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Protein secretory pathway in eukaryal cells is responsible for delivering functional secretory proteins. The dysfunction of this pathway causes a range of important human diseases from congenital disorders to cancer. Despite the piled-up knowledge on the molecular biology and biochemistry level, the tissue-specific expression of the secretory pathway genes has not been analyzed on the transcriptome level. Based on the recent RNA-sequencing studies, the largest fraction of tissue-specific transcriptome encodes for the secretome (secretory proteins). Here, the question arises that if the expression levels of the secretory pathway genes have a tissue-specific tuning. In this study, we tackled this question by performing a meta-analysis of the recently published transcriptome data on human tissues. As a result, we detected 68 as called “extreme genes” which show an unusual expression pattern in specific gene families of the secretory pathway. We also inspected the potential functional link between detected extreme genes and the corresponding tissues enriched secretome. As a result, the detected extreme genes showed correlation with the enrichment of the nature and number of specific post-translational modifications in each tissue’s secretome. Our findings conciliate both the housekeeping and tissue-specific nature of the protein secretory pathway, which we attribute to a fine-tuned regulation of defined gene families to support the diversity of secreted proteins and their modifications.
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| 4. |
- Fletcher, Eugene, 1986, et al.
(author)
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Evolutionary engineering reveals divergent paths when yeast is adapted to different acidic environments
- 2017
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In: Metabolic engineering. - : Academic Press. - 1096-7176 .- 1096-7184. ; 39, s. 19-28
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Tolerance of yeast to acid stress is important for many industrial processes including organic acid production. Therefore, elucidating the molecular basis of long term adaptation to acidic environments will be beneficial for engineering production strains to thrive under such harsh conditions. Previous studies using gene expression analysis have suggested that both organic and inorganic acids display similar responses during short term exposure to acidic conditions. However, biological mechanisms that will lead to long term adaptation of yeast to acidic conditions remains unknown and whether these mechanisms will be similar for tolerance to both organic and inorganic acids is yet to be explored. We therefore evolved Saccharomyces cerevisiae to acquire tolerance to HCl (inorganic acid) and to 0.3 M L-lactic acid (organic acid) at pH 2.8 and then isolated several low pH tolerant strains. Whole genome sequencing and RNA-seq analysis of the evolved strains revealed different sets of genome alterations suggesting a divergence in adaptation to these two acids. An altered sterol composition and impaired iron uptake contributed to HCl tolerance whereas the formation of a multicellular morphology and rapid lactate degradation was crucial for tolerance to high concentrations of lactic acid. Our findings highlight the contribution of both the selection pressure and nature of the acid as a driver for directing the evolutionary path towards tolerance to low pH. The choice of carbon source was also an important factor in the evolutionary process since cells evolved on two different carbon sources (raffinose and glucose) generated a different set of mutations in response to the presence of lactic acid. Therefore, different strategies are required for a rational design of low pH tolerant strains depending on the acid of interest.
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