A model shows a protein molecule with a hydrogen-bond network. (Credit: Boyken et al. / Science)
Biochemists from the University of Washington have engineered complex protein molecules with additional chemical bonds that make it possible to mix and match them like the base pairs of DNA.
The designer proteins, described today in a paper published by the journal Science, could open the way for a kind of synthetic coding system modeled after the groundbreaking double-helix DNA code system discovered by James Watson and Francis Crick back in 1953.
“Think of it this way: The principle of heredity is Watson-Crick base pairing between the two complementary strands of DNA. We invent in the paper an analogous pairing arrangement for proteins,” David Baker, director of the UW’s Institute for Protein Design, told GeekWire in an email.
Computational designs for proteins can be turned into molecular models like the one at left, or into actual molecules with medical applications. (Credit: UW Institute for Protein Design)
Synthetic genomes and gene editing are big things today, but the next big things in biotechnology could be proteins that are designed and edited on computers – and are then synthesized to produce novel types of medicines, materials and molecular machines.
“We are currently doing projects with eight companies, have four companies about to start a paid beta test … and a growing wait list to enter the beta, currently two companies,” Cyrus Biotech CEO Lucas Nivón told GeekWire in an email. “The next big events on Cyrus’s horizon are the official launch of beta in mid-May, and the launch out of beta into initial release in the June/July time frame.”
