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The article discusses how researchers have uncovered a method to modulate gene expression using small molecules. This discovery could lead to the development of drugs that target genetic mutations affecting gene expression, potentially preventing the onset of tumors or genetic diseases. The study, published in Nature Communications, was a collaboration between researchers at IIT in Genoa and EMBL in Grenoble, combining expertise in biochemistry, biophysics, structural biology, and computational simulation. The focus of the study was on splicing.
The correct functioning of cells relies heavily on the ability to finely control gene expression, a complex process by which the information contained in DNA is copied into RNA to eventually give rise to all the proteins and most of the regulatory molecules in the cell. If DNA can be imagined as a dense technical manual, gene expression is the method by which the cell extracts useful information from it.
Researchers at the Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia (IIT) in Genoa and the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Grenoble have unveiled how this process can be modulated using small molecules. The study lays the groundwork for the future identification of potential drugs that act directly on genetic mutations or modifications which alter the process of gene expression, thereby targeting the onset of tumors or genetic diseases.
The research paper, published in Nature Communications, was coordinated by Marco De Vivo, Principal Investigator of the Molecular Modeling & Drug Discovery Lab and Associate Director for Computation at IIT in Genoa, and by Marco Marcia, Group Leader at EMBL Grenoble. The results were achieved by integrating EMBL’s and the Partnership for Structural Biology’s expertise in biochemistry, biophysics, and structural biology, and using the automated MASSIF-1 beamline jointly operated by EMBL and the European Radiation Synchrotron Facility (ESRF) to deliver X-ray photographs of the process. This was combined with expertise in computational simulation from IIT, which allowed for the study of the physico-chemical interactions of the molecules involved.
The study focused on splicing