Gene/Protein Disease Symptom Drug Enzyme Compound
Pivot Concepts:   Target Concepts:
Query: EC:1.5.1.3 (dihydrofolate reductase)
 5,819 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

The development of antimicrobials is critical in this time of increasing antibiotic resistance of most clinically relevant bacteria. To date, all current antibiotics focus on inhibiting crucial enzymatic activities of their protein targets (i.e., trimethoprim for dihydrofolate reductase), thus disrupting in vitro essential gene functions. In contrast, we have previously reported the identification of virstatin, a small molecule that inhibits virulence regulation in Vibrio cholerae, thereby preventing intestinal colonization in an infant mouse model for cholera. Virstatin prevents expression of the two major V. cholerae virulence factors, cholera toxin (CT) and the toxin coregulated pilus, by inhibiting the virulence transcriptional activator ToxT. It has previously been described that the N-terminal domain of ToxT has the ability to form homodimers. We now demonstrate that virstatin inhibits ToxT dimerization, thus demonstrating that it further falls into a unique class of inhibitors that works by disrupting protein-protein interactions, particularly homodimerization. Using virstatin, truncation mutants of ToxT, and a virstatin-resistant mutant, we show that dimerization is required for ToxT activation of the ctx promoter. In contrast, ToxT dimerization does not appear to be required at all of the other ToxT-regulated promoters, suggesting multiple mechanisms may exist for its transcriptional activity.
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PMID:Virstatin inhibits dimerization of the transcriptional activator ToxT. 1728 30

CCAAT-displacement protein/Cut homeobox (CDP/Cux) was initially identified as a transcriptional repressor. However, a number of studies have now suggested that CDP/Cux is a transcriptional activator as well. Stable DNA binding activity of CDP/Cux is up-regulated at the G(1)/S transition by two mechanisms, dephosphorylation by the Cdc25A phosphatase and proteolytic processing to generate a 110 kDa amino-truncated isoform, CDP/Cux p110. The generation of CDP/Cux p110 stimulates the expression of reporter plasmid containing the promoter sequences of some S phase-specific-genes such as DNA polymerase a gene, dihydrofolate reductase gene, carbamoyl-phosphate synthase/aspartate carbamoyl-transferase/dihydroorotase gene, and cyclin A gene. However, DNA binding activity of CDP/Cux is down-regulated at G(2) phase through a binding of cyclin A-cyclin-dependent kinases1 (Cdk1) to CDP/Cux. Furthermore, another CDP/Cux isoform, CDP/Cux p75, has been found to be associated with breast tumors indicating this isoform is involved in the abnormal proliferation of tumor cells. The differences in DNA binding of CDP/Cux isoforms in S and G(2) phases suggest important roles of CDP/Cux in cell cycle progression. In this review, we discuss the functions of CDP/Cux with a focus on its roles in cell cycle regulation and its possible potency leading to the cell cycle reentry of neurons.
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PMID:Contribution of CDP/Cux, a transcription factor, to cell cycle progression. 1806 84

Chemical genetics is a powerful scientific strategy that utilizes small bioactive molecules as experimental tools to unravel biological processes. Bioactive compounds occurring in nature represent an enormous diversity of structures that can be used to dissect functions of biological systems. Once the bioactivity of a natural or synthetic compound has been critically evaluated the challenge remains to identify its molecular target and mode of action, which usually is a time-consuming and labor-intensive process. To facilitate this task, we decided to implement the yeast three-hybrid (Y3H) technology as a general experimental platform to scan the whole Arabidopsis proteome for targets of small signaling molecules. The Y3H technology is based on the yeast two-hybrid system and allows direct cloning of proteins that interact in vivo with a synthetic hybrid ligand, which comprises the biologically active molecule of interest covalently linked to methotrexate (Mtx). In yeast nucleus the hybrid ligand connects two fusion proteins: the Mtx part binding to dihydrofolate reductase fused to a DNA-binding domain (encoded in the yeast strain), and the bioactive molecule part binding to its potential protein target fused to a DNA-activating domain (encoded on a cDNA expression vector). During cDNA library screening, the formation of this ternary, transcriptional activator complex leads to reporter gene activation in yeast cells, and thereby allows selection of the putative targets of small bioactive molecules of interest. Here we present the strategy and experimental details for construction and application of a Y3H platform, including chemical synthesis of different hybrid ligands, construction of suitable cDNA libraries, the choice of yeast strains, and appropriate screening conditions. Based on the results obtained and the current literature we discuss the perspectives and limitations of the Y3H approach for identifying targets of small bioactive molecules.
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PMID:The yeast three-hybrid system as an experimental platform to identify proteins interacting with small signaling molecules in plant cells: potential and limitations. 2263 23

Destabilizing domains (DDs) are genetic tags that conditionally control the level of abundance of proteins-of-interest (POI) with specific stabilizing small-molecule drugs, rapidly and reversibly, in a wide variety of organisms. The amount of the DD-tagged fusion protein directly impacts its molecular function. Hence, it is important that the background levels be tightly regulated in the absence of any drug. This is especially true for classes of proteins that function at extremely low levels, such as lethality genes involved in tissue development and certain transcriptional activator proteins. Here, we establish the uninduced background and induction levels for two widely used DDs (FKBP and DHFR) by developing an accurate quantification method. We show that both DDs exhibit functional background levels in the absence of a drug, but each to a different degree. To overcome this limitation, we systematically test a double architecture for these DDs (DD-POI-DD) that completely suppresses the protein's function in an uninduced state, while allowing tunable functional levels upon adding a drug. As an example, we generate a drug-stabilizable Gal4 transcriptional activator with extremely low background levels. We show that this functions in vivo in the widely used Gal4-UAS bipartite expression system in Drosophila melanogaster. By regulating a cell death gene, we demonstrate that only the low background double architecture enables tight regulation of the lethal phenotype in vivo. These improved tools will enable applications requiring exceptionally tight control of protein function in living cells and organisms.
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PMID:Drug-Inducible Control of Lethality Genes: A Low Background Destabilizing Domain Architecture Applied to the Gal4-UAS System in Drosophila. 2973 46