S Sanchez-Martinez, K Nguyen, S Biswas, V Nicholson, A V Romanyuk, J Ramirez, S Kc, A Akter, C Childs, E K Meese, E T Usher, G M Ginell, F Yu, E Gollub, M Malferrari, F Francia, G Venturoli, E W Martin, F Caporaletti, G Giubertoni, S Woutersen, S Sukenik, D N Woolfson, A S Holehouse, T C Boothby
Tardigrades are microscopic animals that survive desiccation by inducing biostasis. To survive drying tardigrades rely on intrinsically disordered CAHS proteins, which also function to prevent perturbations induced by drying in vitro and in heterologous systems. CAHS proteins have been shown to form gels both in vitro and in vivo, which has been speculated to be linked to their protective capacity. However, the sequence features and mechanisms underlying gel formation and the necessity of gelation for protection have not been demonstrated...
April 2024: Protein Science