'Superglue' from flesh-eating bacteria that could help detect cancer
The terms ‘flesh-eating bacteria’ and ‘good news’ do not normally go together, but a group of researchers from the University of Oxford believe they have engineered a protein from flesh-eating bacteria that acts as a molecular ‘superglue’ and could be used to help detect cancer cells.
S. pyogenes is one of the microbes that can cause the rare necrotising fasciitis, a soft tissue infection, in which the bacteria can cause gangrene, tissue death, systemic disease and toxic shock.
A Genitically modified engineered the glue from a protein, FbaB, that helps Streptococcus pyogenes (S. pyogenes) bacteria infect cells was produced by Spliting FbaB into two parts leading to a larger protein called “SpyCatcher”and a smaller peptide which was named "SpyTag"The gluing action occurs when SpyTag and SpyCatcher meet. The two quickly lock together by forming a strong chemical bond. SpyCatcher and SpyTag can be attached to the millions of proteins in the human body and other living things, thus gluing proteins together. It resists high and low temperatures, acids and other harsh conditions and seals quickly.
The system can glue proteins together at any point at any point on the protein, allowing “many different ways to label proteins and gives us new approaches to assemble proteins together. This material can lock proteins together in ways that could underpin better diagnostic tests , for early detection of cancer cells circulating in the blood,
A future use of the technology would be to test for circulating tumour cells or CTCs, cells which tumours shed into the bloodstream where they act to help spread the cancer to other parts of the body. Detecting CTCs has the potential to help early diagnosis of cancer from samples of blood rather than by biopsies. Detection could also help in determining when new treatments are required to try and stop the cancer from spreading.
-Dixy
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