The CECR2 bromodomain displays distinct binding modes to select for acetylated histone proteins versus non-histone ligands.

Unlabelled: The cat eye syndrome chromosome region candidate 2 (CECR2) protein is an epigenetic regulator involved in chromatin remodeling and transcriptional control. The CECR2 bromodomain (CECR2-BRD) plays a pivotal role in directing the activity of CECR2 through its capacity to recognize and bind acetylated lysine residues on histone proteins. This study elucidates the binding specificity and structural mechanisms of CECR2-BRD interactions with both histone and non-histone ligands, employing techniques such as isothermal titration calorimetry (ITC), nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy, and a high-throughput peptide assay.

Structure-Based Discovery and Development of Highly Potent Dihydroorotate Dehydrogenase Inhibitors for Malaria Chemoprevention.

Malaria remains a serious global health challenge, yet treatment and control programs are threatened by drug resistance. Dihydroorotate dehydrogenase (DHODH) was clinically validated as a target for treatment and prevention of malaria through human studies with DSM265, but currently no drugs against this target are in clinical use. We used structure-based computational tools including free energy perturbation (FEP+) to discover highly ligand efficient, potent, and selective pyrazole-based DHODH inhibitors through a scaffold hop from a pyrrole-based series.

Development of ROS-triggered masked liposomes for activated cellular delivery using a charge balance strategy.

We report a charge balance strategy for reactive oxygen species (ROS)-triggered activation of liposome cell delivery by unmasking cationic membranes. Zeta potential experiments, microplate-based vesicle interaction assays, and cellular delivery studies confirmed that modification of anionic lipid 1 by ROS led to the uncaging of cationic liposomes, thereby driving cellular association.

Deep metabolic phenotyping of humans with protein-altering variants in using a genome-first approach.

Background & Aim: An unbiased genome-first approach can expand the molecular understanding of specific genes in disease-agnostic biobanks for deeper phenotyping. represents a good candidate for this approach due to its known association with steatotic liver disease (SLD).

Methods: We screened participants with whole-exome sequences in the Penn Medicine Biobank (PMBB, n >40,000) and the UK Biobank (UKB, n >200,000) for protein-altering variants in and evaluated their association with liver phenotypes and clinical outcomes.