Nucleic Acid-, Protein and Cell-related Technologies

Cancer remains a major health burden and is the second leading cause of death globally (WHO). The microenvironment of cancer cells plays an important role in disease progression. In particular, the composition of the extracellular matrix regulates angiogenesis, cell proliferation, differentiation, cell survival and apoptosis. Dysregulation and accumulation of the extracellular matrix promotes cellular transformation and metastasis leading to cancer progression. A better understanding of the role ...

The development of the cation channel channelrhodopsin-2 (ChR2) from Chlamydomonas reinhardtii by Prof. Ernst Bamberg and his colleagues, and its application to light-induced modulation of neurons paved the way for the field of optogenetics.
Over time the light-gated cation channel channelrhodopsin-2 (ChR2) has become an indispensable tool in neuroscience. Based on the pioneering work on ChR2 new variants have emerged, differing in their spectrum of light absorption, their kinetic ...

The cellular identity of mature cells that are confined in a specialized genetic expression profile can be overcome by introducing just a few genes that encode for so-called reprogramming factors [1]. By means of this intervention, also known as reprogramming, the cells then become pluripotent and represent induced pluripotent stem cells (iPS cells) [1]. Nowadays, numerous new cell culture models have been established based on reprogramming protocols that yield iPS cells. Such cell culture models ...

The RNA-programmable DNA-endonuclease Cas9 is widely used for genome engineering, where a high degree of specificity is required. Though this is a mechanism well controlled by canonical base-pairing, there is evidence that Cas9 does accept mismatches under certain circumstances.
This might be seen as a threat to precision needed in genome engineering at least in environments where such high precision is ultimately needed and acceptance of mismatches needs to be avoided, e.g.: cellular gene ...

Connectase is an enzyme that fuses target proteins or synthetic compounds via a small recognition tag, using a different reaction mechanism compared to known protein ligases. It prevents side reactions entirely and has absolute specificity, even in highly in complex solutions with minimum concentrations of target molecules.

An innovative high throughput screening method for measurement of RNA- and DNA-polymerase activity at room temperature, based on time-resolved FRET.

An improved method to perform cell-free protein synthesis (CFPS) assays or other fluorescent assays in the context of CFPS with very low reaction mix volumes. Various additional advantages allow to significantly reduce costs and time.

Extracellular vesicles (EVs) such as exosomes and microvesicles participate in the intercellular communication by transferring bioactive molecules between various cells and tissues. Such EVs cross-talk was shown to play important roles in cell–cell communication, cell maintenance, disease progression and therapy. By containing disease specific markers, EVs can also act as diagnostic biomarkers. In addition, synthetic EVs are used as carriers to deliver drugs or mRNA-based vaccines to specific ...

We present an extremely sensitive, reliable and fast novel Lysine deacetylase (KDAC) assay, which can be performed in a continuous format. This novel KDAC assay is based on Firefly luciferase harboring an acetylation on an essential active site lysine, incorporated by genetic code expansion.

We furthermore offer a bacterial selection system that can help engineer KDACs. The selection system uses a reporter enzyme inactivated by lysine modifications at an essential active site residue, thereby ...

Plant pathogenic fungi, oomycetes and bacteria have highly diverse lifestyles, infection strategies and morphologies. Therefore, pesticides frequently target basic cellular processes, as these are well characterized and often very similar among plant pathogens. Many pesticides target enzymes that play a role in e.g. nucleic acid synthesis, respiration, cell division and other essential cellular processes. However, the molecular ...

Direct quantification of the absolute amount of multiple proteins in one a SILAC experiment using Protein Epitope Signature Tags (PrESTs) which consist of a short and unique region of the protein of interest as well as purification and solubility tags and are expressed recombinantly in E. coli

SUMOvera enables versatile purification strategies for broad applications in eukaryotic hosts.

Unique multifunctional oligonucleotide for the ultrafast transcriptome-wide identification of RNA-binding protein (RBP) targets.