Acetylcholinesterases - the similarities and differences
| Authors | |
|---|---|
| Year of publication | 2007 |
| Type | Article in Periodical |
| Magazine / Source | Journal of Enzyme Inhibition and Medicinal Chemistry |
| MU Faculty or unit | |
| Citation | |
| Field | Physical chemistry and theoretical chemistry |
| Keywords | computational chemistry;computer modeling;acetycholinesterase;AChE;species;alignment |
| Description | Acetylcholinesterase (AChE) is a widely spread enzyme playing a very important role in nerve signal transmission. There are several reasons as to why this enzyme is studied, one of them is the treatment of Alzheimers disease. As AChE controls key processes, its inhibition leads to the very fast death of an organism, including humans. However, when this feature is to be used for killing of unwanted organisms (like mosquitoes), one is faced with the question - how much does AChEs differ between species and what are the differences? In this article, the structural point of view was utilized to answer the above questions. The various primary and tertiary alignments show that AChEs are very evolutionary conserved enzymes and this fact leads to difficulties in the search for inhibitors specific for a particular species. |
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