A paper submitted - A new assay to measure mitosis

The measure of productivity in science is publications. One really only gets things done when the research is published.  Today, we submitted a manuscript describing a new method to measure the activity of the enzyme Cyclin-dependent kinase 1 (Cdk1).  This is an important enzyme; it drive cells into mitosis (cell division).  The discovery of Cdk1 and its components led to the Nobel prize awarded in 2001 to Drs Sir Tim Hunt and Sir Paul Nurse.  Other methods to measure Cdk1 activity require the use of radioactive reagents, which are difficult to use, expensive, and dangerous if handled incorrectly.  Our new method requires antibodies, an engineered protein that we made, and western blotting equipment.  Most of the materials are commonly found in cell biology laboratories and we will provide the protein to those who request it.

 

The work was done by a sequence of undergraduate students from the University of Lethbridge, all contributing to the status of "Best Undergraduate Research University of 2012".  All have moved on to better things science related.  To those interested in a pre-print, please let me know.

And the big paper is in press

Our manuscript is accepted in the Biochemical Journal.  It is a too brief moment of satisfaction of completing a project.  A special thanks to the experimentalists who succeeded in converting the complex problem of cell division with damaged DNA into a powerful experimental model. Of the cell lines we tested, HT-29 cells have features that provide a window of the key transition point of entry into mitosis after a checkpoint. 
What's next - we have developed a non-radioisotope assay to measure enzyme activity in mitotic cells; we are testing how to block checkpoint adaptation, and we are looking very closely at the DNA in cancer cells that survive checkpoint adaptation. 
If interested, please feel free to contact us for questions, reagents or a copy of the paper.

The big paper is finally submitted

We have submitted a manuscript on our principle project.  This is the period of calm that lays between the rush to submit and the time before one receives comments from the reviewers.  The manuscript describes how human cancer cells undergo checkpoint adaptation:  a sort of  "double or nothing" cellular game in which cells will divide even though they have damaged DNA.  The manuscript connects the dots of hundreds of observations described in the literature where mitosis has been observed in cells treated with DNA damaging agents.  We have mapped this terrain in a systematic fashion.  We then go beyond mapping by proposing a mechanism to explain the steps to enter mitosis under these conditions.  The important bit is that once you have a good map you can plan where you should go next.
Please feel free to contact me for more information or for a preprint, while the calm lasts.