1. Academic Validation
  2. Structure-guided design of a peripherally restricted chemogenetic system

Structure-guided design of a peripherally restricted chemogenetic system

  • Cell. 2024 Dec 26;187(26):7433-7449.e20. doi: 10.1016/j.cell.2024.11.001.
Hye Jin Kang 1 Brian E Krumm 2 Adrien Tassou 3 Matan Geron 3 Jeffrey F DiBerto 2 Nicholas J Kapolka 2 Ryan H Gumpper 2 Kensuke Sakamoto 2 D Dewran Kocak 2 Reid H J Olsen 2 Xi-Ping Huang 4 Shicheng Zhang 2 Karen L Huang 3 Saheem A Zaidi 5 MyV T Nguyen 5 Min Jeong Jo 1 Vsevolod Katritch 5 Jonathan F Fay 6 Grégory Scherrer 7 Bryan L Roth 8
Affiliations

Affiliations

  • 1 Department of Biotechnology, College of Life Science and Biotechnology, Yonsei University, Seoul, South Korea.
  • 2 Department of Pharmacology, School of Medicine, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC, USA.
  • 3 Department of Cell Biology and Physiology, UNC Neuroscience Center, Department of Pharmacology, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC 27599, USA.
  • 4 Department of Pharmacology, School of Medicine, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC, USA; National Institute of Mental Health Psychoactive Drug Screening Program (NIMH-PDSP), School of Medicine, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC, USA.
  • 5 Department of Quantitative and Computational Biology, Department of Chemistry, Center for New Technologies in Drug Discovery and Development, Bridge Institute, Michelson Center for Convergent Biosciences, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA.
  • 6 Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, School of Medicine, University of Maryland, Baltimore, Baltimore, MD 21201, USA.
  • 7 Department of Cell Biology and Physiology, UNC Neuroscience Center, Department of Pharmacology, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC 27599, USA. Electronic address: gregory_scherrer@med.unc.edu.
  • 8 Department of Pharmacology, School of Medicine, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC, USA. Electronic address: bryan_roth@med.unc.edu.
Abstract

Designer receptors exclusively activated by designer drugs (DREADDs) are chemogenetic tools for remotely controlling cellular signaling, neural activity, behavior, and physiology. Using a structure-guided approach, we provide a peripherally restricted Gi-DREADD, hydroxycarboxylic acid receptor DREADD (HCAD), whose native receptor is minimally expressed in the brain, and a chemical actuator that does not cross the blood-brain barrier (BBB). This was accomplished by combined mutagenesis, analoging via an ultra-large make-on-demand library, structural determination of the designed DREADD receptor via cryoelectron microscopy (cryo-EM), and validation of HCAD function. Expression and activation of HCAD in dorsal root ganglion (DRG) neurons inhibit action potential (AP) firing and reduce both acute and tissue-injury-induced inflammatory pain. The HCAD chemogenetic system expands the possibilities for studying numerous peripheral systems with little adverse effects on the central nervous system (CNS). The structure-guided approach used to generate HCAD also has the potential to accelerate the development of emerging chemogenetic tools for basic and translational sciences.

Keywords

GPCR; chemogenetics; peripheral nervous system.

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