🧬 Imagine having molecular scissors that can precisely snip away disease-causing proteins inside your body—SupTACs do just that!
Published this year in Cell, a team from the Institute of Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences (ICCAS) unveils SupTACs (supramolecular targeting chimeras), a tool that hijacks the cell’s built-in garbage disposal (the ubiquitin-proteasome system) to tag and degrade specific proteins with pinpoint spatial and temporal control in vivo.
Why it matters:
- Traditional drugs need a docking site on the protein, but many disease-related proteins lack one.
- SupTACs bypass this by bringing the target protein straight to the degradation machinery.
- Tested in animal models—including non-human primates—SupTACs showed stable, efficient protein clearance.
Potential impact 🌟
This strategy could unlock new treatments for cancer, Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and other diseases driven by rogue proteins.
As Wang Ming, lead author at ICCAS, explains: “Current protein-degradation approaches often lack precise control over when and where they act, limiting their in vivo effectiveness and raising off-target risks. SupTACs change the game.”
Next up? Researchers are gearing up for clinical trials, aiming to turn this molecular precision into life-changing therapies. Stay tuned for the biotech revolution! 🔬✨
Reference(s):
Chinese scientists achieve breakthrough in precise protein degradation
cgtn.com
