A SURF4-to-proteoglycan relay mechanism that mediates the sorting and secretion of a tagged variant of sonic hedgehog.

SignificanceSonic Hedgehog (Shh) is a key signaling molecule that plays important roles in embryonic patterning, cell differentiation, and organ development. Although fundamentally important, the molecular mechanisms that regulate secretion of newly synthesized Shh are still unclear. Our study reveals a role for the cargo receptor, SURF4, in facilitating export of Shh from the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) via a ER export signal. In addition, our study provides evidence suggesting that proteoglycans promote the dissociation of SURF4 from Shh at the Golgi, suggesting a SURF4-to-proteoglycan relay mechanism. These analyses provide insight into an important question in cell biology: how do cargo receptors capture their clients in one compartment, then disengage at their destination?

Correction: Highly reusable nanoporous silver sheet for sensitive SERS detection of pesticides.

Correction for 'Highly reusable nanoporous silver sheet for sensitive SERS detection of pesticides' by Huanyu Chi et al., Analyst, 2020, 145, 5158-5165, https://doi.org/10.1039/D0AN00999G.

Tunable lipid-coated nanoporous silver sheet for characterization of protein-membrane interactions by surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS).

Membrane environments affect protein structures and functions through protein-membrane interactions in a wide range of important biological processes. To better study the effects from the lipid's hydrophilic and hydrophobic interaction with protein on different membrane regions, we developed the lipid-coated nanoporous silver sheets to provide tunable supported lipid monolayer/bilayer environments for in situ surface-enhanced Raman vibrational spectroscopy (SERS) characterizations. Under the controllable surface pressure, lipid monolayer/bilayer was coated along the microscopic curved surface of nanoporous silver sheets to serve as a cell membrane mimic as well as a barrier to avoid protein denaturation while empowering the high SERS enhancements from the underlying metallic bases allowing detection sensitivity at low physiological concentrations. Moreover, we fine-tuned the lipid packing density and controlled the orientation of the deposited lipid bilayers and monolayers to directly monitor the protein structures upon interactions with various membrane parts/positions. Our results indicate that lysozyme adopted the α-helical structure in both hydrophilic and hydrophobic interaction with lipid membrane. Interestingly, alpha-synuclein folded into the α-helical structure on the negatively charged lipid heads, whereas the hydrophobic lipid tails induced the ß-sheet structural conversion of alpha-synuclein originated from its unstructured monomers. These direct observations on protein hydrophilic and hydrophobic interaction with lipid membrane might provide profound insights into the formation of the ß-sheet-containing alpha-synuclein oligomers for further membrane disruptions and amyloid genesis associated with Parkinson's disease. Hence, with the controllability and tunability of lipid environments, our platform holds great promise for more general applications in investigating the influences from membranes and the correlative structures of proteins under both hydrophilic and hydrophobic effects.

Highly reusable nanoporous silver sheet for sensitive SERS detection of pesticides.

Surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) enables pesticide detection at the point-of-need, but its practical application is limited by expensive and disposable SERS substrates. Here, we report a reusable nanoporous silver (NPAg) sheet for the SERS detection of organochlorine pesticides, aiming to maximize the cost-efficiency of substrate regeneration. The NPAg sheet is prepared by a reduction-induced decomposition method without chemical induced random aggregations. This SERS substrate is sensitive to various analytes regardless of their affinity to a metal surface such as rhodamine B, dichlorodiphenyl-trichloroethane (DDT), and lindane due to its large surface area and the coral rock-like morphology. The SERS signal of lindane, a typical organochlorine pesticide, is identified and quantified with a minimum detectable concentration of 3 × 10-7 M (87 ppb), which is below the maximum residue limits in various foods set by the regulators across the world. More importantly, after a few minutes of ultrasonic cleaning in water, the NPAg sheet can be reused at least 20 times with a reproducible SERS activity. Furthermore, the NPAg sheet remains stable in terms of its sensitivity and reusability after several months of bare strorage. Therefore, the NPAg sheet as a SERS substrate holds great promise for mass production and convenient applications in low-cost pesticide analysis.

Efficient optical plasmonic tweezer-controlled single-molecule SERS characterization of pH-dependent amylin species in aqueous milieus.

It is challenging to characterize single or a few biomolecules in physiological milieus without excluding the influences of surrounding environment. Here we utilize optical plasmonic trapping to construct a dynamic nanocavity, which reduces the diffraction-limited detection volume and provides reproducible electromagnetic field enhancements to achieve high-throughput single-molecule surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) characterizations in aqueous environments. Specifically, we study human Islet Amyloid Polypeptide (amylin, hIAPP) under different physiological pH conditions by combining spectroscopic experiments and molecular dynamics (MD) simulations. Based on a statistically significant amount of time-dependent SERS spectra, two types of low-populated transient species of hIAPP containing either turn or ß-sheet structure among its predominant helix-coil monomers are characterized during the early-stage incubation at neutral condition, which play a crucial role in driving irreversible amyloid fibril developments even after a subsequent adjustment of pH to continue the prolonged incubation at acidic condition. Our results might provide profound mechanistic insight into the pH-regulated amyloidogenesis and introduce an alternative approach for investigating complex biological processes at the single-molecule level.

Moderate Binding between Two SARS-CoV-2 Protein Segments and α-Synuclein Alters Its Toxic Oligomerization Propensity Differently.

The neurological symptoms of long COVID and viral neuroinvasion have raised concerns about the potential interactions between SARS-CoV-2 protein segments and neuronal proteins, which might confer a risk of post-infection neurodegeneration, but the underlying mechanisms remain unclear. Here, we reported that the receptor-binding domain (RBD) of the spike protein and the nine-residue segment (SK9) of the envelope protein could bind to α-synuclein (αSyn) with Kd values of 503 ± 24 nM and 12.7 ± 1.6 µM, respectively. RBD could inhibit αSyn fibrillization by blocking the non-amyloid-ß component region and mediating its antiparallel ß-sheet structural conversions. Omicron-RBD (BA.5) was shown to have a slightly stronger affinity for αSyn (Kd = 235 ± 10 nM), which implies similar effects, whereas SK9 may bind to the C-terminus which accelerates the formation of parallel ß-sheet-containing oligomers and abruptly increases the rate of membrane disruption by 213%. Our results provide plausible molecular insights into the impact of SARS-CoV-2 post-infection and the oligomerization propensity of αSyn that is associated with Parkinson's disease.

Optical tweezers-controlled hotspot for sensitive and reproducible surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy characterization of native protein structures.

Surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) has emerged as a powerful tool to detect biomolecules in aqueous environments. However, it is challenging to identify protein structures at low concentrations, especially for the proteins existing in an equilibrium mixture of various conformations. Here, we develop an in situ optical tweezers-coupled Raman spectroscopy to visualize and control the hotspot between two Ag nanoparticle-coated silica beads, generating tunable and reproducible SERS enhancements with single-molecule level sensitivity. This dynamic SERS detection window is placed in a microfluidic flow chamber to detect the passing-by proteins, which precisely characterizes the structures of three globular proteins without perturbation to their native states. Moreover, it directly identifies the structural features of the transient species of alpha-synuclein among its predominant monomers at physiological concentration of 1 µM by reducing the ensemble averaging. Hence, this SERS platform holds the promise to resolve the structural details of dynamic, heterogeneous, and complex biological systems.

Effective ACE2 peptide-nanoparticle conjugation and its binding with the SARS-Cov-2 RBD quantified by dynamic light scattering.

The infection of coronavirus initiates with the binding between its spike protein receptor binding domain (RBD) and a human cellular receptor called angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2). Here, we construct truncated ACE2 peptide-conjugated gold nanoparticles as antiviral scaffolds and study their binding with the SARS-CoV-2 RBD using dynamic light scattering (DLS). Systematic DLS analysis identifies the effective peptide-nanoparticle conjugation and its efficient, specific, and long-lasting multivalent binding towards the RBD with a binding affinity of 41 nM, indicating the potential of this antiviral platform to compete with natural ACE2-RBD interactions for viral blocking and showcasing an accessible approach to measure the binding constants and kinetics.