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IMAGE: Removing the phosphate group from kinases can activate them, which can be problematic. LanCL adds glutathione to these kinases, after which they became deactivated.
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Credit: Wilfred van der Donk
Researchers from the Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology in collaboration with scientists at Oxford University have published a paper in
Cell reporting the function of LanCL proteins. These proteins are found in eukaryotic cells but their function was previously unknown. The study is the first step towards understanding the importance of these ubiquitous proteins.
Bacteria contain enzymes called LanC that are capable of producing small proteins called lanthipeptides, which are characterized by the addition of a thiol group to a modified serine or threonine amino acid. Similar proteins--called LanC-like or LanCL--have been found in different eukaryotic cells for decades, but their function was unknown.