The mad cow disease on the trail

Submitted by Thomas Pröller, meat-n-more on September 11, 2013, Published in Production & slaughter

The special characteristic of this type of disease is that the transmission of the agent is based on an infectious protein substance and involved neither bacteria nor viruses. This Einweißstoff is known as prion protein. Actually, it is a harmless protein in the human body. It is dangerous to store individual molecules of the prion protein into oligomers together while changing their three-dimensional structure. This happens not only in the course of prion diseases, but also due to aging or specific point mutations. These oligomeric structures are also carriers of infectivity: You can be transmitted between individuals and then characterize the new host their structure even molecules of the prion protein, which initially did not exist as oligomers.

Dr. Kai Schlepckow in the working group of Prof. Harald Schwalbe at the Goethe University succeeded for the first time in gaining detailed insights into the formation mechanism of oligomers of the prion protein. “For every single amino acid, we were able to trace at what point in time it intervened in the aggregation process. This process is much more complex than previously thought, ”reports Prof. Schwalbe. This information is of vital importance because without it it will not be possible to develop therapeutics that prevent the formation of infectious particles.

With the aid of nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy (NMR) spectroscopy, the process of oligomerization could be followed with atomic resolution. In this way it was possible to examine different areas of the prion protein molecule on their specific contributions to the oligomerization. "We were intrigued to see that the molecules do not behave uniformly during the oligomerization. Rather, various molecular regions are involved in different sections of this process. Thus, we the formation mechanism of oligomers of the prion protein with unprecedented accuracy describe, "says Dr. Schlepckow together the results of the study, which was recently described as Very Important Paper in the prestigious journal Angewandte Chemie published.