Building a human kinase gene repository

Study appears in the online early edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

Using the human genome sequence annotation, high-throughput cloning methodologies, and automation, a group at the Harvard Institute of Proteomics lead by Leonardo Brizuela (Harvard Medical School lecturer on biological chemistry and molecular pharmacology) mined public databases to collect the sequence information of all identified human kinase genes and have built a gene repository for this gene class. Their work is described in the online early edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and demonstrates uses of the collection in cellular and biochemical assays.

Kinases are an important class of enzymes that catalyze the phosphorylation of proteins, lipids, sugars, nucleosides, and other cellular components. They play key regulatory roles in all aspects of eukaryotic cell physiology and their deregulation is associated with a number of pathological conditions, which make kinases key targets in drug discovery efforts, primarily in oncology.

This collection is unique because clones in the collection represent protein kinases as well as non-protein kinases, are fully sequenced verified, full-length, and can be sub-cloned by recombination based methodologies. This gene collection will be a useful resource for the scientific community and will facilitate high-throughput cellular and biochemical assays and structural studies of this important gene family.