{"id":16324,"date":"2021-04-20T14:26:02","date_gmt":"2021-04-20T18:26:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/biochemcellbio\/?p=16324"},"modified":"2026-01-07T15:13:39","modified_gmt":"2026-01-07T20:13:39","slug":"research-news-new-discovery-from-the-garcia-marcos-laboratory","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/biochemcellbio\/2021\/04\/20\/research-news-new-discovery-from-the-garcia-marcos-laboratory\/","title":{"rendered":"Research News: New Discovery from the Garcia-Marcos Laboratory"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/biochemcellbio\/profiles\/mikel-garcia-marcos\/\">Garcia-Marcos<\/a> laboratory has discovered that heterotrimeric G-proteins, which are critical molecular switches in cellular communication processes, can trigger different responses in cells depending on the type of protein that activates them.<\/p>\n<p>Heterotrimeric G-proteins are typically activated by G-protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs), which are the target for over one-third of drugs approved for use in the clinic. But G-proteins can also be activated by other proteins that are not GPCRs, a mechanism with important implications for human physiology and disease. The Garcia-Marcos laboratory has used an innovative approach to dissect and compare the consequences of G-protein stimulation by different activators, including GPCRs and various non-GPCR proteins. The approach leveraged a recently developed type of biosensors capable of detecting different forms of active G-proteins in living cells in real time. These were combined with engineered G-protein activator constructs that could be turned on at will with an exogenous synthetic chemical.<\/p>\n<p>The main conclusion is that, contrary to previous beliefs, GPCR and non-GPCR activators elicit different forms of G-protein activation in cells. These findings have important implications in our understanding of pharmacologically actionable signaling hubs in cells, which could be leveraged to envision and design new therapeutic agents.<\/p>\n<p>You can read the article here:<\/p>\n<p>Garcia-Marcos M. Complementary biosensors reveal different G-protein signaling modes triggered by GPCRs and non-receptor activators. Elife. 2021 Mar 31;10:e65620. PMID: 33787494 <a href=\"https:\/\/pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/33787494\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">https:\/\/pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/33787494\/<\/a><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" src=\"\/biochemcellbio\/files\/2021\/04\/Figure-1-325x300.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"325\" height=\"300\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-16325\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/biochemcellbio\/files\/2021\/04\/Figure-1-325x300.png 325w, https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/biochemcellbio\/files\/2021\/04\/Figure-1-768x709.png 768w, https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/biochemcellbio\/files\/2021\/04\/Figure-1.png 915w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 325px) 100vw, 325px\" \/><img loading=\"lazy\" src=\"\/biochemcellbio\/files\/2021\/04\/Figure-1v2-294x300.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"294\" height=\"300\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-16326\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/biochemcellbio\/files\/2021\/04\/Figure-1v2-294x300.png 294w, https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/biochemcellbio\/files\/2021\/04\/Figure-1v2-768x783.png 768w, https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/biochemcellbio\/files\/2021\/04\/Figure-1v2.png 788w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 294px) 100vw, 294px\" \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Garcia-Marcos laboratory has discovered that heterotrimeric G-proteins, which are critical molecular switches in cellular communication processes, can trigger different [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17297,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[104,4654,100],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/biochemcellbio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16324"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/biochemcellbio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/biochemcellbio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/biochemcellbio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17297"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/biochemcellbio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16324"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/biochemcellbio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16324\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16328,"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/biochemcellbio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16324\/revisions\/16328"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/biochemcellbio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16324"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/biochemcellbio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16324"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bumc.bu.edu\/biochemcellbio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16324"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}