The following article on the University of Toronto website describes the recent work of one professor of biochemistry, Igor Stagljar:
Igor Stagljar, Professor in the Faculty of Medicine’s Donnelly Centre for Cellular and Biomolecular Research, and his team developed the first roadmap for ATP-binding cassette (ABC) transporter proteins. These proteins are crucial components of every cell, and are also involved in tumor resistance.
Scientists have struggled with understanding how ABC transporter proteins work and communicate with other proteins. Stagljar and his team, including first author Dr. Jamie Snider, have solved the mystery by using Membrane Yeast Two-Hybrid (‘MYTH’) technology to see how these transporter proteins interact with other vital components in the cell.
Here’s a little more info for those who are interested in biochemistry: ATP-binding cassette transporters are a large class of transmembrane proteins. Typically, they use energy derived from ATP hydrolysis in order to carry out various tasks, such as the transport of substrates across membranes. Issues with ABC transporter proteins often lead to disease, as the article describes: for instance, CFTR falls under this class of proteins, and a variety of mutations in it will lead to cystic fibrosis. Dr. Stagljar has various ongoing projects in his laboratory, but his recent publication in Nature Chemical Biology concerned his work in defining the interactome of ABC transporters. (You can read more about this and the method used in his research, the Membrane Yeast Two-Hybrid system, here.) This sort of work gives us a much better understanding of diseases that are associated with ABC transporters, including macular degeneration, Tangier disease, and cancer (i.e. how cancerous cells are resistant to chemotherapy).
Dr. Stagljar is cross-appointed to the departments of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology and Biochemistry. Last year, he was one of the lecturers in BCH242Y1 (the introductory biochemistry course for specialists), and the material he went over was actually relevant to this news. Hence, as a biochemistry student, it is possible to have the opportunity to be taught by him!