Chaperones Caught in the Act

Like their human namesakes at a debutante ball, chaperone proteins ensure that their young wards behave correctly and avoid inappropriate interactions. That is, chaperone proteins enable newly minted amino acid chains to fold properly into functional proteins while preventing misfolding or clumping together. Scientists captured the image of a key chaperone, Hsp70, in the midst of this important--and difficult--task. The research promises to provide atomic-level clues about how to regulate the activity of Hsp70, which is excessively high in cancers and insufficiently low in some neurodegenerative diseases.
Source: NIGMS Biomedical Beat - Category: Research Source Type: news