Open AccessApproaches to Study Phosphatases
Author(s) -
Sara Fahs,
Pablo Luján,
Maja Köhn
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
acs chemical biology
Language(s) - Uncategorized
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.899
H-Index - 111
eISSN - 1554-8937
pISSN - 1554-8929
DOI - 10.1021/acschembio.6b00570
Subject(s) - phosphatase , computational biology , biology , field (mathematics) , computer science , data science , enzyme , biochemistry , mathematics , pure mathematics
Phosphatases play key roles in normal physiology and diseases. Studying phosphatases has been both essential and challenging, and the application of conventional genetic and biochemical methods has led to crucial but still limited understanding of their mechanisms, substrates, and exclusive functions within highly intricate networks. With the advances in technologies such as cellular imaging and molecular and chemical biology in terms of sensitive tools and methods, the phosphatase field has thrived in the past years and has set new insights for cell signaling studies and for therapeutic development. In this review, we give an overview of the existing interdisciplinary tools for phosphatases, give examples on how they have been applied to increase our understanding of these enzymes, and suggest how they-and other tools yet barely used in the phosphatase field-might be adapted to address future questions and challenges.