With all this talk about power supplies and stainless steel, I am
wondering if I am in the right group. Isn't anyone as blown away in awe
as I am with Roger Tsien's latest coup:
Griffin BA, Adams SR, Tsien RY. (1998). Specific covalent labeling of
recombinant protein molecules inside living cells.
Science 281, 269-273.
He shows that one can add a little bit of alpha-helix (WEAAAREACCRECCARA)
to a protein and use this as a target for the fluorescent reporter
FLASH-EDT2. The idea is to engineer the target as a tag for your favorite
protein, transfect the cell with a construct expressing this tagged
protein, and then feed the cell:
4',5'-bis(1,3,2-dithioarsolan-2-yl)fluorescein
which converts to FLASH-EDT2. The dye homes to the tagged protein and now
you can visualize your tagged protein IN A LIVING CELL! Without gfp!
The FLASH-peptide complex is ~50,000x more fluorescent than FLASH alone.
It seems like you can make your own FLASH-EDT2 according to note 20 on p
271, or you can wait for some vendor to sell it commercially.
I smell a great discovery...
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Anton Scott Goustin, Ph.D. (*)
Center for Molecular Medicine and Genetics
Wayne State University *
5047 Gullen Mall, Room 5167 * *
Detroit, Michigan 48202-3917 USA *
TELEPHONE 313-993-7688 *
FAX 313-577-6200 *
E-mail asg at cmb.biosci.wayne.edu * UMa
WWW http://cmmg.biosci.wayne.edu/asg/asg-home.html
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"IT IS KNOWN THAT NATURE WORKS CONSTANTLY WITH THE SAME MATERIALS. SHE
IS INGENIOUS TO VARY ONLY THE FORMS." --E. Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire, 1807
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