Article - 30/01/2019

candidum – computer-assisted enzyme design

Industry has been using enzymes for over a hundred years. While it initially had to content itself with natural enzymes, it is now increasingly possible to design tailor-made biocatalysts with specific properties. The start-up company candidum GmbH from Stuttgart promises to achieve this faster than ever before - mostly thanks to accelerated virtual screening.

Article - 29/01/2019

Targeted RNA editing with the body’s own enzyme activity

Completely new possibilities for research and gene therapy became available following the development of the CRISPR/Cas method for targeted modification of the genome. However, treatment with molecular scissors is not without risk as potential errors are stored in the genome forever. Scientists from Tübingen have developed an alternative method in which the intervention takes place at the RNA level using the body's own enzymes and is thus…

NMI project WOUNDSENS - 23/10/2024

Wound monitoring using sensory nanofibres

Monitoring the condition of chronic, non-healing wounds requires wound dressings to be changed at short, regular intervals. In the EU-funded WOUNDSENS project, researchers at the NMI in Reutlingen are using electrospinning to produce novel types of wound dressings. These consist of biosensory fibres that send information about the condition of the wound to the outside, thereby improving inflammation detection.

The working group around Dr. Philipp Rathert at the Institute for Biochemistry and Technical Biochemistry investigates the regulation of epigenetic networks of certain cancers and ways of treating them. The working group published its new findings in April.

In our bones, specialized cells called osteoblasts are responsible for building up bone substance. A team of researchers led by scientists from the DKFZ-Hector Cancer Institute at the University Medical Center Mannheim* and the University Medical Center Hamburg Eppendorf has now identified an enzyme that controls the activity of osteoblasts.

How are proteins in our cells modified while they are still being synthesized? An international team of researchers from the University of Konstanz, Caltech, and ETH Zurich has deciphered the molecular mechanism of this vital process.

Glycolysis is an important sugar degradation pathway that cancer cells in particular depend on. Scientists at the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) have now shown that liver cancer cells in mice and humans depend on a key enzyme of glycolysis, Aldolase A. When it is switched off, glycolysis reverses from an energy-producing to an energy-consuming process.

Christiane Opitz, scientist at the German Cancer Research Center, is being awarded this year's Ita Askonas Prize of the European Federation of Immunological Societies. Opitz has discovered how tumor cells use certain metabolites to protect themselves against the immune system. Her research findings may provide important clues for the development of new therapeutic concepts.

Cancer cells often grow in environments that are low in nutrients, and they cope with this challenge by switching their metabolism to using proteins as alternative "food". Building on genetic screens, an international team of scientists could identify the protein LYSET as part of a pathway that allows cancer cells to make this switch. Their findings are now published in the journal Science.

Effective drugs against viral diseases like COVID-19 are urgently needed now and in the future. The emergence of viral mutants and yet unknown viruses could push vaccines to their limits. The DZIF scientist and bioinformatician Andreas Dräger from the University of Tübingen is working on a computer-based method that can help to accelerate the time-consuming identification and development of antiviral agents. Using a novel analysis technique that…

More than 65,000 men fall ill with prostate cancer each year in Germany. Twelve thousand of them develop a treatment-resistant form which eventually ends in death. Now, a team of researchers from the Medical Faculty at the University of Freiburg has developed an active substance that might in future represent a new treatment option.

Drugs consist of molecules developed in the drug laboratory that bind to their target, usually a protein, and thus exert their effect. The actual duration of binding of a drug molecule to its target protein varies depending on the drug. The lifetime of the drug-target complex can play a critical role in the efficacy of a drug, as a long residence time at the target can be crucial for the drug's action in some cases.

Dossier - 02/12/2013

RNA interference confidence is returning

The 15-year history of RNA interference is not short on dramatic effects. It begins with the unexpected discovery and publication of the process of post-transcriptional gene silencing in 1998 for which Andrew Fire and Craig Mello were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine just eight years after their discovery. In 2001 Thomas Tuschl succeeded in switching off genes in human cells with small synthetic pieces of RNA siRNA.

Genetic alterations that promote the development and spread of tumors are difficult to identify. This is especially true for mutations in the non-protein-coding regions of the genome, which include all important regulatory sequences. Scientists at the German Cancer Research Center have now published an algorithm that detects cancer drivers in both the protein-coding and non-coding regions of the genome.

Researchers from Konstanz and Zurich have deciphered a biochemical mechanism that ensures that newly formed proteins are processed correctly when they leave the cell's own protein factories. This solves a decade-old puzzle in protein sorting.

An important enzyme helps the body produce selenium proteins – this discovery could open up new strategies for treating cancer in children. This has been published by scientists from the University of Würzburg, the University Sao Paolo, the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) and the Heidelberg Stem Cell Institute HI-STEM*.

Mitochondria are the power plants of cells, and they contain their own genetic material and RNA molecules. Scientists from the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) have now discovered that certain modifications in mitochondrial RNA boost the invasive spread of cancer cells by supporting protein synthesis in mitochondria.

The nuclease Cas13b associated with the CRISPR gene scissors, which is an enzyme that degrades nucleic acids, has the potential to be used in the future in hereditary diseases to switch off unwanted genes. In the fight against infections, this nuclease is also being researched as an antiviral agent, as Cas13b can specifically intervene in the genetic material of viruses and render them harmless.

If the development of blood vessels in the placenta is impaired, fetal growth retardation may result. Scientists from the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) and the Mannheim Medical Faculty of Heidelberg University discovered that the correct development of functioning blood vessels in the mouse placenta is controlled epigenetically: One of the enzymes that modify gene activity using methyl groups is responsible.

Bioinspired technologies - 03/04/2020

Diagnostics with molecular scissors – is this also possible for on-site COVID-19 tests?

The CRISPR-Cas gene-editing technology is one of the most important developments in molecular biology in recent years. It utilises molecular scissors with which nucleic acids can be cut and edited almost arbitrarily. Researchers in Freiburg, Germany have now successfully used the technology for diagnostic purposes. They are currently working intensively on expanding the system to enable it to detect genome sequences of the novel SARS-CoV-2 virus.

Personalised medicine - 16/09/2021

Pharmacogenomics enables individualised drug prescription

Every person is unique, and their reaction to medications can be just as individual. For this reason, unexpected side effects occur time and again with common drugs, sometimes with life-threatening consequences. At the Dr. Margarete Fischer-Bosch Institute for Clinical Pharmacology (IKP) in Stuttgart, the influence of hereditary factors on these harmful reactions is being investigated in order to enable individualised therapies.

Heidelberg scientists succeed in boosting the efficiency of CRISPR/Cas9 and related methods and modifying initially inaccessible DNA sequences.

Because of their highly active metabolism, many tumors are susceptible to a special type of cell death, ferroptosis. Nevertheless, cancer cells often manage to escape this fate. Scientists at the German Cancer Research Center have now discovered a new mechanism by which normal as well as cancer cells protect themselves against ferroptosis.

Researchers at the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Freiburg have gained significant new insights into metabolic processes in the kidney. The scientists from the Institute of Genetic Epidemiology at the Medical Center - University of Freiburg measured tiny molecules, so-called metabolites, which occur in blood and urine and reflect our metabolism, in samples from more than 5,000 study participants.

A precursor of cholesterol can protect cancer cells from a form of cell death known as ferroptosis. Scientists of the University of Würzburg, the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ), and the Stem Cell Institute HI-STEM* published this finding in the journal Nature. The results opens up exciting prospects for further improving the treatment of cancer and other diseases associated with oxidative stress and ferroptosis.