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- Title
Caspase 8 mediated apoptotic cell death induced by β-sheet forming polyalanine peptides
- Authors
Giri, Kalyan; Ghosh, Utpal; Bhattacharyya, Nitai P.; Basak, Soumen
- Abstract
Expansion of a polyalanine stretch from 10 to 12–17 residues in the N-terminus of the protein PABP2 has been implicated in the genetically acquired disease oculopharyngeal muscular dystrophy, characterized by nuclear protein deposits. Here we report a correlation between the structural properties and cell toxicity of two peptides mimicking the N-terminal domain of PABP2: one containing seven and the other 11 uninterrupted alanine residues. Consistent with earlier observations, the longer peptide (11-ala) was found to adopt β-sheet structure while the shorter one (7-ala) formed α-helix over a wide range of concentrations (∼20–500 μM). We observed that treatment with 11-ala resulted in significantly enhanced death of Chinese hamster V79 cells, compared to the effect of treatment with 7-ala, via the cytochrome c mediated apoptotic pathway. Increases in caspase 8 and caspase 3 activity were also observed in human cells (K562) treated with 11-ala. These results indicate that the toxicity of pathogenic peptides is directly linked to their β-sheet structure and also support recent observations that small oligomeric species of peptides and proteins are the key toxic elements in causing protein aggregation diseases.
- Subjects
ALANINE; PROTEINS; APOPTOSIS; MUSCULAR dystrophy
- Publication
FEBS Letters, 2003, Vol 555, Issue 2, p380
- ISSN
0014-5793
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1016/S0014-5793(03)01294-8