SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Biodesy, Inc., a leader in next-generation technologies measuring structure and structural changes at the molecular level, today announced that its Delta® System was used to discover a novel mechanism involved in the earliest steps of viral infection. The collaborative study was led by Theodore Jardetzky, PhD, Professor of Structural Biology at Stanford University and involved researchers at Stanford University and Northwestern University. The Nature Communications publication entitled “Monomeric ephrinB2 binding induces allosteric changes in Nipah virus G that precede its full activation” was published online in October.
The Delta System’s core Second Harmonic Generation (SHG) technology enabled the team of researchers to detect subtle conformational and dynamic changes in the protein structure of a Nipah virus (NiV), which causes fatal encephalitis in up to 70 percent of infected patients with evidence of human–to–human transmission. Understanding the mechanism of cell infection for this virus will shed light on the pathobiology of NiV infection and spur the rational development of effective therapeutics.
"Our SHG studies provided unique insight into the possibility that the conformational changes were occurring and drove our discovery that receptor binding has long-range effects on the NiV protein structure,” said Senior Author, Dr. Jardetsky. “The SHG experiments were absolutely central to advancing our understanding. SHG provides a powerful and sensitive approach to detecting subtle conformational and dynamic changes in protein structures that complements other structural and biophysical techniques.”
“Subtle changes in structure or dynamics like these are likely fundamental to biological function, but have largely remained unseen to date,” said Josh Salafsky, PhD, Founder and Chief Scientific Officer at Biodesy. “We believe the high sensitivity and ease of use of SHG as a structural discovery tool for solution-based measurements in real time, complemented by other techniques, can quickly reveal key findings that underpin mechanism and function in many domains of biology.”
“This is a seminal publication for Biodesy that further validates the Delta System’s ability to detect very small conformational changes,” said Dominique Bridon, PhD, Chief Executive Officer at Biodesy. “These findings set a new precedent for investigating pharmacological targets and should open the door to many other transformative applications in the future.”
To read the full manuscript, please visit https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-017-00863-3.
For more information about Biodesy and the Delta System, please visit www.biodesy.com.
To register for a Biodesy webinar on Dec. 5, 2017, with First Author, Joyce Wong, PhD, Department of Structural Biology at Stanford University School of Medicine, please visit https://register.gotowebinar.com/register/4050544048412700930.
About Biodesy
Biodesy is developing the first products and systems to rapidly measure both protein structure and function in real time, with applications in basic research, drug discovery and structural biology. Biodesy has developed a unique and highly sensitive technology for detecting changes in conformation and conformational dynamics in proteins and other biological molecules. Its technology, based on a phenomenon called second-harmonic generation (SHG), can monitor structural changes at non-specific (random) sites or at a specific site within a protein in real time. Since changes in protein structure affect function, the ability to detect and characterize structural variations provides significant insights into molecular interactions, protein function, and human disease. Biodesy is located in South San Francisco, California. For more information, please visit www.biodesy.com.
The Biodesy Delta System is for Research Use Only and not for use in diagnostic procedures.
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