A growing team of groundbreaking scientists around the world are now sharing their lab notebooks online
I haven’t done that much lab work lately as I have been working on crystal data processing among other things. However, a couple of weeks ago I purified some ACVR1/ALK2 for crystallisation for fragment screening (which happened on Friday) and for co-crystallisation with some of our compounds. The experimental details are here, on Zenodo. As Read More …
ALK2 and ALK5 are Type I receptors on the cell surface that can be activated by specific ligands (illustrated in the diagram below). Once activated by ligand, ALK2 or ALK5 interact with Type II receptor to be phosphorylated (phospho-group chemically attached to the protein). Subsequently, ALK2 phorphorylates SMAD1/5/8 while ALK5 phorphorylates SMAD2. Phosphorylated SMADs then Read More …
Within a month (hopefully) I’ll be convincing C2C12 myoblast cells to express all kinds of mutant ALK2 to test its activity and interactions with other proteins within the cell. I’ll be doing this by treating them so that they’ll take up pieces of circular DNA (plasmids) that express those mutant proteins (i.e. transfecting them). Seeing Read More …
Diffuse Intrinsic Pontine Glioma (DIPG) is a type of brain tumour in the brainstem which is highly aggressive and occurs in children. Treatment options for DIPG are very limited because these tumours do not respond to the chemotherapy drugs currently available for adult gliomas. Whole genome and exome sequencing identified several frequently mutated genes in Read More …
Background What is the link between a rare genetic disease that causes soft tissues to turn to bone, and a lethal childhood brain cancer? At first glance, with such different clinical phenotypes, it seems unlikely there could be any link, but it has been shown through whole genome sequencing of diffuse intrinsic pontine glioma (DIPG) Read More …
Hello world! I think I should let you know about the two diseases my project covers before we get started: Firstly, diffuse intrinsic pontine glioma (DIPG for short) is a childhood brain tumour that grows in a part of the brainstem called the pons. The disease progresses rapidly and the fact that it grows within the brainstem, and invades into nearby Read More …
