Conformational flexibility of bioactive molecules poses a major challenge to computational biology. tCONCOORD generates structure ensembles based on geometrical considerations and has been successfully applied to predict protein conformational flexibility and essential degrees of freedom. We have now developed a graphical user interface (GUI) for tCONCOORD, which substantially facilitates the s...

Following primary infection in humans, the human cytomegalovirus (HCMV) persists in a latent state throughout the host's lifetime despite a strong and efficient immune response. If the host experiences some form of immune dysregulation, such as immunosuppression or immunodeficiency, HCMV reactivates, thereby emerging from latency. Thus, in the absence of effective functional immune responses, a...

Plants are one of the natural sources of bioactive molecules with potential abilities against different stress conditions. During pathogenic exposure, an array of biologically active molecules like reactive oxygen intermediates, phytoalexins and defense peptides are synthesized as measure of plant resistance to combat the intensifying conditions. Such molecules play a key role in advancement in...

Recent innovations in DNA nanofabrication allow the creation of intricately shaped nanostructures ideally suited for many biological applications. To advance the use of DNA nanotechnology for the controlled release of bioactive molecules, we report a general strategy that uses light to liberate encapsulated cargoes from DNA nanostructures with high spatiotemporal precision. Through the incorpor...

Chiral tetrahydroquinoxalines and hydroquinoxalinones represent the core structure of many bioactive molecules. Herein, a simple efficient Rh-thiourea-catalyzed asymmetric hydrogenation for enantiopure dihydroquinoxalinones was developed under 1 MPa...

The aim of tissue engineering is to promote the repair of functional tissues. For decades, the combined use of biomaterials, growth factors (GFs), and stem cells has been the base of several regeneration strategies. Among these, biomimicry emerged as a robust strategy to efficiently address this clinical challenge. Biomimetic materials, able to recapitulate the composition and architecture of t...

Herein, we report the use of a versatile photocleavable nitrobenzyl linker to micropattern a wide variety of bioactive molecules and photorelease them on demand. On one end, the linker has an NHS group that can be coupled with any amine, such as peptides, proteins or amine-linkers, and on the other end an alkyne for convenient attachment to materials with an azide functional group. This linker ...

The discovery of novel bioactive molecules advances our systems-level understanding of biological processes and is crucial for innovation in drug development. For this purpose, the emerging field of chemical genomics is currently focused on accumulating large assay data sets describing compound-protein interactions (CPIs). Although new target proteins for known drugs have recently been identifi...

Adipogenesis is the process by which precursor stem cells differentiate into lipid laden adipocytes. Adipogenesis is regulated by a complex and highly orchestrated gene expression program. In mammalian cells, the peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor γ (PPARγ), and the CCAAT/enhancer binding proteins (C/EBPs) such as C/EBPα, β and δ are considered the key early regulators of adipogenesis, ...