Drug discovery and sea hares: bigger is better
Drug discovery and sea hares: bigger is better
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DOI：
10.1016/j.tibtech.2005.11.001
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发表时间：
2006-01-01
影响因子：
17.3
通讯作者：
Barsby, T
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Barsby, T
传统上，小分子（< 1 kDa）主导了海洋天然产物的化学和化学生态学研究。然而，在最近的出版物中报道，Yang和同事们从加利福尼亚州海兔的防御分泌物中分离出了一种60 kDa的抗菌蛋白。这种蛋白质，逃逸蛋白，已被表征为具有抑菌和杀菌活性的L-氨基酸氧化酶。他们的工作突出了海洋生物衍生蛋白质在很大程度上尚未开发的生物医学潜力，并解决了与无脊椎动物天然产品相关的供应问题。这也导致了关于新蛋白质生态功能的有趣假设。
Traditionally, small molecules (< 1 kDa) have dominated the study of the chemistry and chemical ecology of marine natural products. However, as reported in a recent publication, Yang and co-workers have isolated a 60-kDa antibacterial protein from the defensive secretions of the sea hare Aplysia, californica. This protein, escapin, has been characterized as an L-amino acid oxidase with bacteriostatic and bacteriocidal activities. Their work highlights the largely untapped biomedical potential of marine organism-derived proteins and addresses the problems of supply associated with invertebrate natural products. It also leads to intriguing hypotheses about the ecological function(s) of the new protein.