what makes a NEW protein??

[Nico van Belzen]

In article 
<Pine.A41.3.96.970722081542.116478A-100000 at asterix.uni-muenster.de>, 
hohoff at uni-muenster.de says...
>
>My question is not that philosophical:
>
>if you have a protein of 130 aa ('x')and you find another one with just
>one aa exchange (2 bp exchanged, y) - do you really have a NEW protein 
>wich you can publish elsewhere (stating at least: x 99% identical to 
y...)?

I would not consider publishing on paper (unless the exchange is at a 
critical position, and would influence the function of the protein); 
however, why not publish in electronic databases like EMBL/Genbank? 
Ultimately this will give an indication of the allelic variation for the 
protein.

>
>I have observed this twice with the same protein and wondered because I
>thought that a minimum of 5% will create a 'new' protein. Are there any
>(nomenclature) rules for the scientific community?

You mean you've actually seen people _from the same group_ publishing two 
proteins with an 1 aa difference under different names? That really is a 
way of creating a large publication list; if the habit spreads the human 
genome will have significantly more than the postulated 100,000 genes :-)

Now for different research groups, that's quite another matter. Having 
worked on a cDNA for years maybe, including production of antibody 
against the protein, just to see somebody else publish in Genbank or on 
paper essentially the same sequence under a name that is of course 
different from the name you have carefully chosen from the drying pool 
from available three-letter words... I can't blame anyone (like myself) 
from referring to the protein by their own chosen name, provided that the 
gene is cloned and characterized long before the competing group has 
published. Time will tell which name will ultimately prevail. 

Best regards, Nico van Belzen
  --------------------------------------------------
  Nico van Belzen, PhD        belzen at hema.fgg.eur.nl
  Dept. of Hematology,  Erasmus University Rotterdam
  P.O. box 1738   3000DR Rotterdam   The Netherlands
  phone +31-10-4087756/7426/7768  fax +31-10-4362315
  --------------------------------------------------