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Characterization of the binding interface between transcription factors FOXO4 and p53
Brzezina, Adam ; Obšil, Tomáš (advisor) ; Pavlíček, Jiří (referee)
This work deals with the study of human transcription factors FOXO4 and p53. FOXO4 is a member of the "O" subfamily of FOX transcription factors. Genes encoding FOXO proteins are evolutionarily conserved across species. FOXO transcription factors regulate the expression of genes involved in the control of metabolism, cell cycle and cell proliferation, cell survival and stress resistance. They are considered tumour suppressors because of their ability to arrest the cell cycle and induce apoptosis. However, their function in tumorigenesis appears to be more complicated, as recent studies indicate a poorer prognosis for the development of tumours that express higher levels of FOXO4. The p53 protein is a thoroughly studied naturally occurring tumour suppressor. The cellular response after its activation is somewhat similar to that of FOXO4, it can also block cell cycle progression or induce apoptosis depending on the cell type and severity/type of cellular stress. Both FOXO4 and p53 appear to be key molecules affecting aging. Under stress conditions, p53 and FOXO4 interact with each other and together increase the expression of p21 protein, thereby inducing the transition of cells to a senescent state. The accumulation of senescent cells is recognised as one of the main causes of ageing and the...
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Proteomic analysis of selected oncohematological diseases
Pimková, Kristýna ; Dyr, Jan (advisor) ; Kodíček, Milan (referee) ; Petrák, Jiří (referee)
Oxidative stress is an important factor in carcinogenesis of oncohematological diseases. However its role in the pathogenesis of myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS) remains unclear. In this study, we have determined the oxidative status and evaluated proteomic changes in plasma of MDS patients as a consequence of oxidative dysbalance (oxidative modifications, protein-protein interaction and complex forming). We measured the levels of total cysteine, homocysteine, cysteinyglycine, glutathione, nitrites and nitrates in the plasma from 61 MDS patients and 23 healthy donors using high performance liquid chromatography. Glutathione and nitrites levels reduced significantly while other aminothiols levels increased significantly in plasma of MDS patients. This association with oxidative stress did not correlate with iron overload. We also found enhanced levels of asymmetric dimethylarginine in serums of middle aged patients with MDS that correlate to posttranslational modifications of proteins arginyl residues. Furthermore, carbonylated proteins level was significantly elevated in MDS patients compared to healthy donors. Using mass spectrometry, 5 S-nitrosylated blood platelets proteins were identified in plasma and blood platelets of MDS patients and set of 16 plasma proteins with high probability of...
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Interaction of Cytochromes P450 with Flavodoxin: a theoretical study
Culka, Martin ; Martínek, Václav (advisor) ; Chmelík, Josef (referee)
Cytochromes P450 are diverse group of heme enzymes found in most species on Earth. In humans they are involved in metabolism of foreign compounds or steroids, bacteria employ cytochromes P450 for utilization of various hydrophobic substrates. General reaction catalyzed by cytochromes P450 is monooxygenation, when one atom of oxygen molecule is introduced into the substrate, while the other is reduced producing water. NADPH:cytochrome P450 oxidoreductase or cytochrome b5 usually serves as an electron donor providing electrons needed for activation of oxygen in eukaryotic organisms, in bacteria small FeS proteins or flavoproteins are these electron donors. It was shown earlier that bacterial electron donor flavodoxin could also interact with human cytochromes P450 in vitro. This thesis employs molecular modeling techniques to support a hypothesis that flavodoxin is responsible for reduction of human (1A2, 2A6, 2A13, 2C9, 2C19, 3A4) and bacterial (101A1 a 176A1) cytochromes P450 heterologously expressed in Escherichia coli. An initial guess of possible mutual orientations of cytochrome P450 and flavodoxin was predicted using information-driven protein-protein docking. The stability of these complexes was examined by directed dissociation method. The most stable orientation for each cytochrome P450 was further...
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Identification of crystal packing contacts using a method for detection of protein-protein interaction sites
Mitková, Natália ; Hoksza, David (advisor) ; Jakubec, Dávid (referee)
One of the fundamental issues when obtaining the protein quaternary structures is to be able distinguish biological interfaces from crystal packing contacts. The existence of these false contacts is the consequence of the crystallographic method which is used for obtaining the tertiary and quaternary structure. Gaining knowledge of how proteins interact in 3D space is key to understanding their functions and offers the opportunity to apply the knowledge to inhibitor impact analysis, drug design, immunotherapy, or de novo protein design. Furthermore, this knowledge is an essential requirement when applying in silico approaches. The bachelor thesis is divided into two parts. The first part contains literature retrieval of existing methods addressing the problem of crystallographic contact detection together with relevant datasets for an objective evaluation. The second practical part is focused on the comparison of evaluations of the previously developed method for the protein-protein interface prediction, INSPiRE, and the EPPIC classifier. Key words: bioinformatics, crystal packing contact, crystallography, protein structure, protein- protein interactions
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Structural characterization of human protein kinase CaMKK2 and its interactions with binding partners
Koupilová, Nicola ; Obšil, Tomáš (advisor) ; Pavlíček, Jiří (referee)
5 Abstract Ca2+/calmodulin-dependent protein kinase kinase 2 (CaMKK2) belongs to the serine/ threonine protein kinase family, which is involved in the calcium signaling pathway. The increase of intracellular calcium concentration induces the activation of calmodulin (CaM), which then activates its binding partners including CaMKII, CaMKIII, CaMKK1 and CaMKK2. CaMKK2 activates CaMKI, CaMKIV and AMP-dependent kinase, AMPK, by phosphorylation. CaMKK2 is naturally present in cells in an autoinhibited state, which is caused by the steric hindrance of the active site by the autoinhibitory domain. When calmodulin binds to the calmodulin-binding domain, the autoinhibitory domain is removed and the active site becomes accessible. Upon activation, CaMKK2 undergoes autophosphorylation, which increases its enzyme activity. Negative regulation of CaMKK2 is mediated by cAMP-dependent protein kinase A (PKA)- and GSK3-dependent phosphorylation. Sites phosphorylated by PKA have been identified for both CaMKK1 and CaMKK2. Two of them are also motifs recognized by scaffolding 14-3-3 proteins. Previous studies have shown that the 14-3-3 protein binding maintains phosphorylated CaMKK2 in an inhibited state by blocking the dephosphorylation of S495, which prevents the binding to calmodulin. However, it is unclear if it is the...
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Applications of graph theory in protein function prediction
Kalábová, Nikola ; Hartman, David (advisor) ; Kratochvíl, Miroslav (referee)
The rapid development of the whole-genome sequencing methods and their reducing cost resulted in a huge number of sequenced genomes. Developing reliable methods for in- silico annotation of the expeditiously growing number of sequenced genomes is the next challenge of modern biology. We described a graph-theoretical approach for function prediction from the protein-protein interaction networks and outlined its strengths and weaknesses. We illustrate the principles of this approach on selected algorithms based on different ideas and provide their comparison and evaluation. 1
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Site-directed mutagenesis of human cytochromes P450 family 1 and their interacting partners
Milichovský, Jan
Cytochromes P450 represent a large group of proteins metabolizing variety of substrates. Many of them are responsible for metabolism of xenobiotics including drugs and chemical carcinogens. Heme-protein cytochrome b5 is a single-electron donor cooperating with a NADPH:cytochrome P450 reductase and NADH:cytochrome b5 reductase 3 enzyme. Cytochrome b5can affect the xenobiotic metabolism via modulation of the cytochromes P450 activity. One of the goals of the Ph.D. thesis was to utilize site directed mutagenesis of cytochromes P450 family 1 to elucidate the mechanism of their nitroreductase activity. Another aim was to study the interaction between cytochrome b5 and cytochromes P450 of the 1A subfamily using site directed mutagenesis on presumed protein-protein contact interface. Another goal was to utilize the combination of theoretical and experimental approaches to explain variance in the reduction state of several human cytochromes P450 heterologously expressed in intact bacterial cells. The results found in the thesis show that nitroreductase activity of CYP1A1, CYP1A2 and CYP1B1 is mediated by the presence of a particular hydroxyl group in their active centre. Single mutation introducing a hydroxyl group to the specific part of CYP1B1 active site to the active site turned on its artificial...
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Study of interactions of forkhead box O (FOXO) transcription factors with DNA
Hofmanová, Adéla ; Obšil, Tomáš (advisor) ; Pavlíček, Jiří (referee)
This work studies the "O" subgroup of FOX transcription factors, which consists of four members (FOXO1, FOXO3, FOXO4 and FOXO6). They are important regulatory molecules that play a critical role in a number of physiological and pathological processes such as cell cycle control, the body's response to stress, differentiation and apoptosis. Due to their ability to induce cell death, they are generally considered to be tumor suppressors. However, recent studies have shown that they can also induce an opposite effect, i.e. to promote tumor progression or induce resistance to drugs used in the therapy of certain types of tumors. Despite intensive research, a number of questions regarding the function of FOXO proteins still remain unanswered. One question is whether the small structural differences observed in the highly conserved DNA-binding domains (DBD) of FOXO transcription factors affect their DNA- binding affinities. Furthermore, it is unclear whether the recently described protein-protein interaction of FOXO-DBD with the transcription factor p53 affects their DNA-binding affinity. Moreover, the role of the binding site for Mg2+ ion which was found in the crystal structure of FOXO4-DBD:DNA, is also still not understood. To clarify these questions, the DNA-binding domains of the human transcription...
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Functional study of the SUF pathway in the cell of Monocercomonoides exilis and Paratrimastix pyriformis
Zelená, Marie ; Hampl, Vladimír (advisor) ; Verner, Zdeněk (referee)
The synthesis of iron-sulfur clusters is an essential cellular process, which depends on complex biosynthetic pathways. In model eukaryotes, these pathways are the ISC pathway in the mitochondria and the CIA pathway in the cytosol. A recent genome and transcriptome analysis showed, that an amitochondriate protist Monocercomonoides exilis lacks the canonical ISC pathway, which has been replaced by a bacterial SUF pathway. A close free-living relative of M. exilis, Paratrimastix pyriformis possesses a mitochondrion-related organelle, yet also possesses a SUF pathway instead of ISC. The acquisition of the SUF pathway has been suggested as the primordial cause for mitochondrial loss in M. exilis, which is the first documented eukaryotic organism without a mitochondrion. The SUF pathway has been the subject of numerous studies in bacteria, however, its role as the core provider of iron-sulfur clusters for eukaryotic cells has been reported in merely a handful of eukaryotes and was based predominantly on genomic data. This thesis focuses on the putative ATPase SufC and the putative scaffold protein SufB. Both proteins were successfully produced in recombinant forms. SufC has been found to possess ATPase activity in vitro, which was increased upon interaction with SufB. The conditions for theATPase...
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Effect of cytochrome b5 on enzyme kinetics of Sudan I hydroxylation catalyzed by human cytochrome P450 1A1
Netolický, Jakub ; Martínek, Václav (advisor) ; Černá, Věra (referee)
Cytochromes P450 are the major xenobiotics converting enzymes. They are classified as mixed function monooxygenases (MFO). Isoform 1A1 is a extrahepatic form found mainly in the lung and other tissues. It is strongly induced by polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons and their derivatives via the Ah receptor. As a marker reaction for this enzyme can be used hydroxylation of Sudan I, which has previously been widely used as a azo dye in industry, but since 1980s it is banned for coloring food and cosmetics for its negative influence on the organism. NADPH:cytochrome P450 reductase is the major electron donor for cytochrome P450 catalyzed monooxygenation reactions. Another electron carrier for cytochrome P450 catalyzed reactions is cytochrome b5. It was shown that cytochrome b5 can stimulate, inhibit or have no effect on P450 catalyzed reactions. This thesis aims to evaluate the influence of the ration between NADPH:cytochrome P450 reductase and cytochrome b5 on cytochrome P450 1A1 catalyzed Sudan I hydroxylation. The main goal is to characterize the influence of electron donor and electron transfer ratios on hydroxylation of Sudan I, and to determine the kinetic parameters KM and VMAX for selected protein ratios. Partial aims of the thesis were to characterize the recombinant proteins used in this study...
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