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The chemistry behind redox regulation with a focus on sulphur redox systems
Author(s) -
Jacob Claus,
Anwar Awais
Publication year - 2008
Publication title -
physiologia plantarum
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.351
H-Index - 146
eISSN - 1399-3054
pISSN - 0031-9317
DOI - 10.1111/j.1399-3054.2008.01080.x
Subject(s) - redox , chemistry , sulfur , intracellular , sulfur metabolism , fungicide , biochemistry , environmental chemistry , combinatorial chemistry , biology , organic chemistry , botany
Sulphur metabolism in plants provides a wealth of natural products, including several chemically unusual substances, such as thiosulphinates, polysulphides and isothiocyanates. Many of these reactive sulphur species (RSS) exhibit a distinct redox behaviour in vitro, which translates into a rather interesting biological activity in vivo, such as antibiotic, fungicidal, pesticidal or anticancer activity. While the molecular basis for such activity has long remained obscure, research into sulphur‐based redox systems during the past 5–10 years has achieved a better knowledge of the in vitro properties of RSS and has led to an improved understanding of their impact on intracellular redox signalling and control pathways in living cells. It has become apparent that the redox chameleon sulphur occurs in biological systems in about 10 different oxidation states, which give rise to an extensive and complicated network of sulphur‐based redox events. Together, natural sulphur products from plants and their intracellular targets provide the basis for innovative design of novel antibiotics, fungicides, pesticides and anticancer agents.