Chemical genetics uses small molecules to modulate protein function and, in principle, has the potential to perturb any biochemical event in a complex cellular context. The application of chemical genetics to dissect biological processes has become an attractive alternative to mutagenesis screens due to its technical simplicity, inexpensive reagents, and low-startup costs. In vertebrates, only fish and amphibians are amenable to chemical genetic screens. Xenopus frogs share a long evolutionary history with mammals and so represent an excellent model to predict human biology. In this review, we discuss the lessons learned from chemical genetic studies carried out in zebrafish and Xenopus. We highlight how Xenopus can be employed as a convenient first-line animal model at various stages of the drug discovery and development process and comment on how they represent much-needed tools to bridge the gap between traditional in vitro and preclinical mammalian assays in biomedical research and drug development. Developmental Dynamics 238:1287-1308, 2009. (c) 2009 Wiley-Liss, Inc.

Download full-text PDF

Source
http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/dvdy.21967DOI Listing

Publication Analysis

Top Keywords

chemical genetics
12
drug discovery
8
zebrafish xenopus
8
chemical genetic
8
chemical
5
simple vertebrate
4
vertebrate models
4
models chemical
4
genetics drug
4
discovery screens
4

Similar Publications

Refining breast cancer genetic risk and biology through multi-ancestry fine-mapping analyses of 192 risk regions.

Nat Genet

January 2025

Division of Epidemiology, Department of Medicine, Vanderbilt Epidemiology Center, Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center, Vanderbilt University Medical Center, Nashville, TN, USA.

Genome-wide association studies have identified approximately 200 genetic risk loci for breast cancer, but the causal variants and target genes are mostly unknown. We sought to fine-map all known breast cancer risk loci using genome-wide association study data from 172,737 female breast cancer cases and 242,009 controls of African, Asian and European ancestry. We identified 332 independent association signals for breast cancer risk, including 131 signals not reported previously, and for 50 of them, we narrowed the credible causal variants down to a single variant.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Molecular subtypes, such as defined by The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA), delineate a cancer's underlying biology, bringing hope to inform a patient's prognosis and treatment plan. However, most approaches used in the discovery of subtypes are not suitable for assigning subtype labels to new cancer specimens from other studies or clinical trials. Here, we address this barrier by applying five different machine learning approaches to multi-omic data from 8,791 TCGA tumor samples comprising 106 subtypes from 26 different cancer cohorts to build models based upon small numbers of features that can classify new samples into previously defined TCGA molecular subtypes-a step toward molecular subtype application in the clinic.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Development of an FKBP12-recruiting chemical-induced proximity DNA-encoded library and its application to discover an autophagy potentiator.

Cell Chem Biol

December 2024

Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Cambridge, MA 02142, USA; Center for Computational and Integrative Biology, Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA 02114, USA; Department of Molecular Biology, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, MA 02114, USA. Electronic address:

Chemical inducers of proximity (CIPs) are molecules that recruit one protein to another and introduce new functionalities toward modulating protein states and activities. While CIP-mediated recruitment of E3 ligases is widely exploited for the development of degraders, other therapeutic modalities remain underexplored. We describe a non-degrader CIP-DNA-encoded library (CIP-DEL) that recruits FKBP12 to target proteins using non-traditional acyclic structures, with an emphasis on introducing stereochemically diverse and rigid connectors to attach the combinatorial library.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

mRNA export factors store nascent transcripts within nuclear speckles as an adaptive response to transient global inhibition of transcription.

Mol Cell

January 2025

Cancer Research Division, Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre, Melbourne, VIC, Australia; Sir Peter MacCallum Department of Oncology, University of Melbourne, Melbourne, VIC, Australia; Department of Haematology, Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre, Melbourne, VIC, Australia; Centre for Cancer Research, University of Melbourne, Melbourne, VIC, Australia. Electronic address:

Several transcription inhibitors have been developed as cancer therapies. However, they show modest clinical activity, highlighting that our understanding of the cellular response to transcriptional inhibition remains incomplete. Here we report that potent inhibitors of transcription not only impact mRNA output but also markedly impair mRNA transcript localization and nuclear export.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Metabolic engineering of Priestia megaterium for 2'-fucosyllactose production.

Microb Cell Fact

January 2025

Department of Chemical & Biological Engineering, Korea University, Seoul, 136-763, Korea.

Background: 2'-Fucosyllactose (2'-FL) is a predominant human milk oligosaccharide that significantly enhances infant nutrition and immune health. This study addresses the need for a safe and economical production of 2'-FL by employing Generally Recognized As Safe (GRAS) microbial strain, Priestia megaterium ATCC 14581. This strain was chosen for its robust growth and established safety profile and attributing suitable for industrial-scale production.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Want AI Summaries of new PubMed Abstracts delivered to your In-box?

Enter search terms and have AI summaries delivered each week - change queries or unsubscribe any time!