This week’s articles uncover mechanisms of drug action, a way bacteria can help defend against the flu, and a ubiquitin ligase that facilitates the maturation of red blood cells.
METABOLISM
12 is better than 1? Not entirely
Myers et al. show that a drug that activates all 12 isoforms of the kinase AMPK has some beneficial metabolic effects for type 2 diabetes but may pose risks to cardiac health (see also Hardie).
CELL BIOLOGY
Removing orphan proteins from the system
Yanagitani et al. and Nguyen et al. identified a protein quality control pathway mediated by the ubiquitin-conjugating enzyme UBE2O that alters proteome content to promote the differentiation of red blood cells (see also Hampton and Dargemont).
MICROBIOLOGY
Eat more plants for influenza resilience
Steed et al. found that desaminotyrosine (DAT), which is produced by microbial digestion of plant flavonoids, promotes antiviral responses to influenza.
PHARMACOLOGY
DREADD not the designer compound?
Gomez et al. discovered that DREADDs (designer receptors exclusively activated by designer drugs) expressed in the brain are not activated by the designer compound CNO (clozapine N-oxide) itself but rather by the CNO metabolite clozapine, which has multiple endogenous targets.
