Department of Chemical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Imperial College London, London, U.K.
Imperial College Centre for Synthetic Biology, Imperial College London, London, U.K.
ACS Chem Biol. 2021 Feb 19;16(2):238-250. doi: 10.1021/acschembio.0c00771. Epub 2021 Jan 7.
Protein methylation is a key post-translational modification whose effects on gene expression have been intensively studied over the last two decades. Recently, renewed interest in non-histone protein methylation has gained momentum for its role in regulating important cellular processes and the activity of many proteins, including transcription factors, enzymes, and structural complexes. The extensive and dynamic role that protein methylation plays within the cell also highlights its potential for bioengineering applications. Indeed, while synthetic histone protein methylation has been extensively used to engineer gene expression, engineering of non-histone protein methylation has not been fully explored yet. Here, we report the latest findings, highlighting how non-histone protein methylation is fundamental for certain cellular functions and is implicated in disease, and review recent efforts in the engineering of protein methylation.
蛋白质甲基化是一种关键的翻译后修饰，其对基因表达的影响在过去二十年中得到了深入研究。最近，人们对非组蛋白蛋白质甲基化的重新关注因其在调节重要细胞过程和许多蛋白质（包括转录因子、酶和结构复合物）的活性中的作用而得到了增强。蛋白质甲基化在细胞内发挥的广泛而动态的作用也凸显了其在生物工程应用中的潜力。事实上，尽管合成组蛋白蛋白质甲基化已被广泛用于工程基因表达，但非组蛋白蛋白质甲基化的工程尚未得到充分探索。在这里，我们报告了最新的发现，强调了非组蛋白蛋白质甲基化对某些细胞功能的重要性，并探讨了疾病中的作用，同时还回顾了蛋白质甲基化工程的最新进展。
