Second (February) and two (papers)! Alexandra and Yi’s double teaming paper accepted in Current Protocols in Chemical Biology

Seeing as it is the superbowl…

Second (February) and two (papers)! Alexandra and Yi’s double teaming paper accepted in Current Protocols in Chemical Biology

Single-protein-specific redox targeting in live mammalian cells and C. elegans

Alexandra Van Hall-Beauvais#, Yi Zhao, Daniel A. Urul, Marcus J. C. Long, and Yimon Aye*

(#, first author. *, corresponding author)

Alexandra and Daniel are two of our graduate student members and are both NSF GRFP fellows. Yi and Marcus are two of our postdoctoral colleagues. We are excited about this team work!

Significance Statement

Redox signaling utilizes small reactive molecules that covalently modify targets and modulate cellular decision-making. Modifying proteins largely without enzymatic guidance, these inherently reactive signaling molecules engage on-target, and even at moderate levels of modification, enable accurate downstream response. Conventional methods to study redox signaling involving uncontrolled administration of reactive species from outside of cells/animals give rise to complex responses. Bolus exposure also does not account for temporal and compartmentalized nature of redox signaling. To address these limitations, T-REX was developed to enable precision modification of a single protein, thereby linking on-target modifications directly to function. This protocol outlines the steps to perform T-REX in live mammalian cells and C. elegans, including determination of targeting efficiency and the site of modification.