Validating the Interactome Scientists have charted a
flurry of genome-level protein-protein interaction maps
recently, now they must figure out how best to use them By
Jeffrey M. Perkel
If you want a sense of one of the hottest trends in biology
today, open the hood of your car. At first, the jumble of
boxes, wires, circuitry, and hoses that meets your eyes more
likely will confuse than inform. Careful examination,
however, exposes an intricate order, in which modular
processes interact with each other to build ever-larger
systems, culminating in a working automobile.
A cell presents an equally confusing array of parts. But
like the car, the cell can be analyzed as a series of
interacting systems working together to build a whole
greater than its parts. "The entire cell can be viewed as a
factory that contains an elaborate network of interlocking
assembly lines, each of which is composed of a set of large
protein machines," wrote National Academy of Sciences
president Bruce Alberts in 1998.
Over the last few years, researchers engaged in the nascent
field of "interactomics" have been busy deconstructing these
molecular machines, mapping protein-protein interactions in
bacteria, yeast, fruit flies, nematodes, mice, and humans.
The resulting charts have exposed the functions of
previously mysterious proteins, have helped drug companies
hone their development efforts, and are laying the
foundations for systems biology.
Read the rest at The Scientist the-the-Open ↗
scientist.com/yr2004/jun/feature_040621.html
Posted by Robert Karl Stonjek.