((( Latest Protein Spotlight issue: it did it its way )))
July 2014
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Temperatures can get cold. And living organisms have to find ways of
keeping themselves warm. Humans use clothes. Polar bears grow fur.
Whales are lined with blubber. And many animals avoid the cold by
migrating to warmer parts of the planet. But for cold-blooded animals
- such as fish - things are sometimes more complicated. Especially
when they live in waters which are ice-cold, on a seasonal basis or
not. The formation of ice in an organism is dangerous because it can
damage cells irreversibly. To solve this problem, Nature thought up an
antifreeze system which hinders ice formation: antifreeze proteins.
There are all sorts of antifreeze proteins but one is particularly
special - Maxi - and keeps fish alive in waters as cold as - 1.9 °C.
As its name suggests, it is much larger than the other antifreeze
proteins known to date, but it also behaves very differently. What is
more, its 3D structure has shed a very different light on the way the
core of a protein is formed.
Read more: http://www.proteinspotlight.org
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