Projects
The influence of protease targeting drug leads on substrate processing characte rized in complex proteomes KU Leuven
Development of photo-activatable protease inhibitors and activity-based probes and their application in the study of dynamic proteolytic processes KU Leuven
Proteases are involved in many highly regulated biological processes, such as apoptosis, cell-cell communication and blood coagulation. Inhibitors and activity-based probes (ABPs) have been successfully utilized as chemical tools to study these enzymes. However, when studying fast and dynamic processes, local and temporal acivation of these reagents is desirable. Such reagents can first of all be used for basic study of these processes, but ...
Synthesis of novel fluorescently quenched activity-based probes for serine proteases and the application in live cell imaging using various detection techniques KU Leuven
For its immune system to function properly, the human body relies on a multitude of signaling processes executed by many different types cells. The most common one of these cell types is the neutrophil. Neutrophil cells patrol the blood and once encountering pathogens, they react to kill it making use of their armory contained in different types of granules. The neutrophil serine proteases are an important part of this armory and they can, ...
Chemical probes for imaging bacterial proteases in lung infections. University of Antwerp
Development of metal-oxo clusters as homogeneous and heterogeneous artificial proteases KU Leuven
Proteomics studies the complete set of proteins found in living cells, tissues or organisms, representing the end result of gene transcription, translation, and protein synthesis up to post-translational protein modifications (PTM). As proteins are key players in biochemical and biological processes the study of protein levels, function, localization, and regulation is of crucial importance in biological and biomedicinal research. Generally, ...
Proteases in inflammation and cell death Ghent University
Inflammation plays a major role in onset and progression of many inflammation-associated diseases diseases, including colon cancer, inflammatory bowel disease and rheumatoid arthritis. Several proteases are crucial for the onset and propagation of the pathology. Among these are cysteine cathepsins and caspases that are often found at the sites of inflammation. There is increasing evidence that inflammation is tightly linked with cell death ...
Tackling the challenges in selective and potent targeting of Tumor Micro-Environment Proteases. University of Antwerp
Regulation and function of immune cell proteases in multiple sclerosis. KU Leuven
Proteases, enzymes that cleave amino acid bonds within proteins, are crucial molecules in health and disease. Previous studies have implicated proteases in multiple sclerosis pathogenesis, for example by helping immune cells to travel from the blood into brain tissue or by removing the protective sheath (myelin) that covers nerve fibers. With support from the Charcot Foundation, we will study the interactions between proteases derived from ...
The synthesis and application of novel activity-based probes for the visualization of cysteine proteases. KU Leuven
Proteases are enzymes that cut proteins by catalyzing the hydrolysis of the peptide bond. They can be found in almost every organism, where they play a part in many biological pathways and are involved in various human diseases. For example, cathepsins, a class of cysteine proteases, are upregulated in various cancers, making them an interesting biomarker and suitable targets for tumor labeling.
An excellent method for the detection of ...