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Themed Issue: Drug delivery technologies and immunological aspects of photodynamic therapy

a themed issue on Drug delivery technologies and immunologicalIssue 5 of Photochemical and Photobiological Sciences has now been published online and is a themed issue on Drug delivery technologies and immunological aspects of photodynamic therapy.

The guest editors Kristian Berg (Oslo University Hospital), Jakub Golab (Medical University of Warsaw), Mladen Korbelik (British Columbia Cancer Agency) and David Russell (University of East Anglia), introduce the topic in their editorial which you can read here.

The cover features an article from Gang Zheng and co-workers in Canada and China entitled ‘Cytosolic delivery of LDL nanoparticle cargo using photochemical internalization’.  In this study endolysosmal disruption using PCI was attempted on surface-loaded, protein-loaded and core-loaded cargo incorporated into LDL nanoparticles. You can read the full article here.

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Structural Evolution of Luciferase

Structural evolution of luciferase activity in Zophobas mealworm AMP/CoA-ligase (protoluciferase) through site-directed mutagenesis of the luciferin binding siteIn this pioneering study a team from Brazil and China have used site-directed mutagenesis of protoluciferase to better understand the structural evolution of luciferase activity.

A major mystery in bioluminescence is how it arose during evolution.  It is known that beetle luciferases evolved from AMP-CoA-ligases, also known as protoluciferases, which catalyse the activation of carboxylic acids.  In this study a luciferase-like AMP-CoA-ligase from Zophobas morio mealworm was taken as a protoluciferase model.  Site directed mutagenesis was used to replace residues in the carboxylic binding site with the respective ones conserved in beetle luciferases.

The team found that one substitution (I327T) improved the luminescence activity indicating the importance of the β-hairpin motif which it is contained in for bioluminescence activity in beetle luciferases.  It also indicates a possible route for the evolution this activity.

Interested in knowing more?  Read the full article for free until May 20th!

Structural evolution of luciferase activity in Zophobas mealworm AMP/CoA-ligase (protoluciferase) through site-directed mutagenesis of the luciferin binding site
R. A. Prado, J. A. Barbosa, Y. Ohmiya and V. R. Viviani
Photochem. Photobiol. Sci., 2011, Advance Article
DOI: 10.1039/C0PP00392A

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