Friday Pat Eyers pushed our two papers on new screens we have developed for sulfotransferases up onto Biorxiv. More about the history of this work later. For now the briefest of summaries.
The heparan sulfate 2-O sulfotransferase paper is here
and the tyrosine sulfotransferase paper is here.
The key messages are:
(1) Mimetics of PAPS, the universal sulfate donor, that inhibit sulfotransferases are present in kinase inhibitor libraries.
(2) We demonstrate selectivity, in that some compounds inhibitor one sulfotransferase better than they do the other.
(3) PAPS mimetics look like providing a rich vein of sulfotransferase inhibitors of varying selectivity, rather like ATP mimetics have done for kinases.
(4) We have two very effective high throughput screens, which means no sulfotransferase is now beyond our reach.
Sulfation has been frustrating due to the lack of chemical tools to selectively inhibit a particular sulfotransferase. With these two papers we can foresee such tools in the not too distant future and with these, we can unpick the role of sulfation in biology, from development, through homeostasis to disease.
Exciting times!
Ferniglab Blog 