Anatoli B. Meriin, PhD
Instructor, Biochemistry & Cell Biology

Biography
My research focuses on cellular mechanisms of aggregation of aberrant and damaged proteins. Abnormal polypeptides that escape proteasome-dependent degradation tend to aggregate and can be transported via microtubules to an aggresome, an organelle where aggregated proteins are degraded by autophagy. Protein aggregation plays a major role in various neurodegenerative disorders. We used synphilin 1, a protein implicated in Parkinson disease, as a model to study these processes in cell cultures. We have demonstrated that contrary to popular believes protein aggregation in a cell is not a spontaneous event and relies upon various cellular elements. We found that the cell senses the levels of defective ribosomal products to activate various stress responses including protein aggregation. Furthermore, we demonstrated that mild slowdown of a ribosome can significantly improve the quality of the newly synthesized polypeptides. We found that Bag3-Hsp70 module implicated in carcinogenesis is involved in sensing of the defective ribosomal products and triggering of the stress responses. We work to identify additional elements of this response.
Websites
Education
- St. Petersburg State Chemical-Pharmaceutical Academy, PhD
- St. Petersburg State Polytechnic University, MS
Publications
- Published on 1/1/2023
Baldan S, Meriin AB, Sherman MY. Using a Modified Proximity Ligation Protocol to Study the Interaction Between Chaperones and Associated Proteins. Methods Mol Biol. 2023; 2693:163-174. PMID: 37540434.
Read at: PubMed - Published on 9/28/2022
Meriin AB, Zaarur N, Roy D, Kandror KV. Egr1 plays a major role in the transcriptional response of white adipocytes to insulin and environmental cues. Front Cell Dev Biol. 2022; 10:1003030. PMID: 36246998.
Read at: PubMed - Published on 9/19/2022
Meriin AB, Zaarur N, Bogan JS, Kandror KV. Inhibitors of RNA and protein synthesis cause Glut4 translocation and increase glucose uptake in adipocytes. Sci Rep. 2022 Sep 19; 12(1):15640. PMID: 36123369.
Read at: PubMed - Published on 12/1/2021
Baldan S, Meriin AB, Yaglom J, Alexandrov I, Varelas X, Xiao ZJ, Sherman MY. The Hsp70-Bag3 complex modulates the phosphorylation and nuclear translocation of Hippo pathway protein Yap. J Cell Sci. 2021 12 01; 134(23). PMID: 34761265.
Read at: PubMed - Published on 4/3/2019
Pan X, Meriin A, Huang G, Kandror KV. Insulin-responsive amino peptidase follows the Glut4 pathway but is dispensable for the formation and translocation of insulin-responsive vesicles. Mol Biol Cell. 2019 06 01; 30(12):1536-1543. PMID: 30943117.
Read at: PubMed - Published on 2/4/2019
Narayanan A, Meriin A, Andrews JO, Spille JH, Sherman MY, Cisse II. A first order phase transition mechanism underlies protein aggregation in mammalian cells. Elife. 2019 02 04; 8. PMID: 30716021.
Read at: PubMed - Published on 7/9/2018
Meriin AB, Narayanan A, Meng L, Alexandrov I, Varelas X, Cissé II, Sherman MY. Hsp70-Bag3 complex is a hub for proteotoxicity-induced signaling that controls protein aggregation. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2018 07 24; 115(30):E7043-E7052. PMID: 29987014.
Read at: PubMed - Published on 8/24/2015
Zaarur N, Xu X, Lestienne P, Meriin AB, McComb M, Costello CE, Newnam GP, Ganti R, Romanova NV, Shanmugasundaram M, Silva ST, Bandeiras TM, Matias PM, Lobachev KS, Lednev IK, Chernoff YO, Sherman MY. RuvbL1 and RuvbL2 enhance aggresome formation and disaggregate amyloid fibrils. EMBO J. 2015 Sep 14; 34(18):2363-82. PMID: 26303906.
Read at: PubMed - Published on 1/27/2014
Zaarur N, Meriin AB, Bejarano E, Xu X, Gabai VL, Cuervo AM, Sherman MY. Proteasome failure promotes positioning of lysosomes around the aggresome via local block of microtubule-dependent transport. Mol Cell Biol. 2014 Apr; 34(7):1336-48. PMID: 24469403.
Read at: PubMed - Published on 8/17/2012
Meriin AB, Mense M, Colbert JD, Liang F, Bihler H, Zaarur N, Rock KL, Sherman MY. A novel approach to recovery of function of mutant proteins by slowing down translation. J Biol Chem. 2012 Oct 5; 287(41):34264-72. PMID: 22902621.
Read at: PubMed
View 28 more publications: View full profile at BUMC