PROTEINS: STRUCTURE, FUNCTION AND IMPORTANCE

IN MEDICINE

Pablo Andrés Lara Portacio – UPB MedellinMolecular Biology – Medicine School – Third Semester

INTRODUCTION

Proteins are macromolecules that practically execute all of the cell’s activities, and are in charge of the normality of these activities

They catalize a great variety of chemical reactions, they affect the properties that characterize living organisms.

They also guide the flow of electrons in the photosyntesis process, they transmit information between specific cells, and they control the pass of molecules between cell membranes.

This news report is about the development of a computer software that allows the exploration of the protein structure in three dimensions, allowing rotation and structure examination

When you explore the protein in three dimensions, you are able to see why the protein works as a channel, or maybe which aminoacid gives a determinated property

Discovering how to neutralize specific proteins, a disease could be disallowed to get expressed in a patient, for example a toxin created by an microorganism infection in a human.

Studying the proteins structures, allow scientist to discover how to block interactions between certain proteins, how to block a protein from working as a channel, and how to correctly denaturalize this molecules.

I personally believe that protein blocking and structure correct identification is the future in medicine, becuase treatment will be less and less invasive, and they will only alterate proteins structures, aminoacid sequences, etc, and with this, medics will be able to block a protein harmful action

PERSONAL OPINION

This news report is about the discovery of a 21st aminoacid, because science community has only 20 known aminoacids which form all the living organisms proteins.

The selenocysteine is key molecule to the full understanding of genetic alphabet. It also serves for understanding of several proteins

As we can see with this comparative picture, there are several atomic changes in the structure, where a Selenium atom is added to the molecule.

Selenium is an atomic element, from the periodic table, and not very common in living organisms

A very interesting characteristic of the biosynthesis of selenocysteine is that, it is accompanied by a RNAt that is specific to selenocysteine. This RNAt blocks the STOP codons, so the sequence doesn’t stop adequately, and selenocysteine can be added to the chain

PERSONAL OPINION

I personally believe that the study of this aminoacid allows scientists to discover new proteins, discover more precise genetic sequencing.

Also, I think the RNAt that was discovered to work with Selenocysteine is of great importance, because we can study how is the mechanism that gets the codons inhibed.

CLINICAL IMPORTANCE

Proteins are fascinating macromolecules that will always create curiosity in scientific investigations. With the each time deeper and deeper study of proteins, we are getting information about the relation of a specific protein and the manifestation of a disease.

CLINICAL IMPORTANCE

Maybe we are heading to an age of clinical interventions, where patients don’t have to get through a lot of suffering and paliative treatments, because medics will be able to make some tests, identify a disease through not only clinical manifestations but also maybe have the tools to find an specific protein in the patient body, and block the protein coding in the DNA.

CLINICAL IMPORTANCE

The inhibition of either the transcription or the translation of a certain protein can stop a disease from manifestating

CLINICAL IMPORTANCE

But not only transcription and translation can be blocked, we could also stop a protein function as a toxin or as a channel with certain medicaments that denaturalize them.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

- Martínez LM. Biología Molecular. 5. ed. Medellín: Universidad Pontificia Bolivariana; 2009. p. 125-127.

- James F. Hinton. Virtual Reality Gives Insight on Protein Structures. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/07/100722160114.htm

- Scientists Clarify Structural Basis for Biosynthesis of Mysterious 21st Amino Acid. http://www.sciencedaily.com/

THANKS FOR TAKING THE TIME TO READ IT