In a recent article published in Bioconjugate Chemistry, graduate student Veronica Diaz-Rodriguez and undergraduate Elena Werst, in the research group of Mark Distefano, in collaboration with Erh-Ting Hsu and Professor Christine Hrycyna at Purdue University and Dr. Elena Ganusova and Professor Jeff Becker at the University of Tennessee demonstrate that a‑Factor Analogues Containing Alkyne- and Azide-Functionalized Isoprenoids Are Efficiently Enzymatically Processed and Retain Wild- Type Bioactivity.
Taken together, their results reported here indicate that metabolic labeling experiments with azide- and alkyne-functionalized isoprenoids can yield prenylated products that are fully processed and biologically functional. Overall, these observations suggest that the isoprenoids studied that incorporate bioorthogonal functionality can be used in metabolic labeling experiments without concern that they will induce undesired physiological changes that may complicate data interpretation. Since these probes are being used to study a variety of diseases, these results have important medical implications.