Max Planck Institute of Biochemistry

Tryptoline stereoprobe elaboration identifies inhibitors of the GRPEL1–HSPA9 complex

Abstract Activity-based protein profiling has identified hundreds of human proteins from diverse classes that react at cysteine residues with stereochemically defined electrophilic compounds (stereoprobes). The structure–activity relationships underlying these stereoprobe–protein...

Cullin-5 RING E3 ligase limits CD8⁺ T-cell persistence and effector responses during chronic antigen stimulation

Abstract T-cell exhaustion limits durable antitumor responses and remains a barrier to adoptive cell therapies (ACT) in solid tumors. To identify regulators of T-cell persistence, we performed genome-wide CRISPR knockout screens in primary human CD8⁺ T cells expressing an NY-ESO-...

Serological and transcriptomic response of African fruit bats to immune challenge with recombinant vaccines expressing Ebola or Nipah virus antigens

Abstract Bats are hosts to diverse zoonotic viruses which can cause high case fatality rates in humans. Since detecting viruses in bats is difficult, antibodies are often used for surveillance, though their significance remains unclear in the absence of in vivo immunological stud...

Autoinducer-2 functions as both a quorum-sensing and metabolic signal in Escherichia coli

ABSTRACT Bacteria integrate diverse environmental signals to coordinate behavior, yet the relationship between nutrient sensing and quorum sensing (QS) remains incompletely understood. Autoinducer-2 (AI-2) is unique among QS signals in that its production is tightly linked to cen...

Scalable clinical proteomics from DNA/RNA extraction flowthroughs enables integrated proteogenomic profiling from a single cancer biopsy

Abstract Background Precision oncology has largely relied on genomic and transcriptomic sequencing to guide therapy selection in patients with advanced cancer. However, these molecular layers do not fully capture the functional state of tumors, as proteins largely represent the a...

Mechanosensitive phosphorylation of NFATC4 at S213/S217 drives fibroblast-to-myofibroblast transition and fibrosis

Mechanosensitive feedback between tissue stiffness and cellular contractile forces instructs cell identity. To characterize phosphorylation-mediated mechanosensing, we charted the global phosphoproteome dynamics of primary human lung fibroblasts on fibronectin-coated polydimethyl...

Automated synthetic cell-based screening for designed proteins with emergent functions

Abstract Designing minimal biological systems with emergent functions such as spatiotemporal self-organization is a central goal of bottom-up synthetic biology. While computational optimization and design show promises to accelerate functional protein engineering through Design-B...

Unravelling the genetic structure and genetic relationships of indigenous Greek sheep breeds using SNP markers

Abstract Background Indigenous sheep of Greece represent important genetic resources shaped by long-term adaptation to diverse environments. However, many populations face demographic decline, genetic erosion, and their genomic diversity remains inadequately characterized. This s...