Mr Mohamed Ramadan

 

Student 1 ilma Crt, Bulleen, VIC 3105 Research Group: La Trobe University, Faculty of Science, Technology and Engineering, Electronic Engineering,   Email: link Phone: 0420710587

 

Current Research Activities

Genomic analysis of Lumpy Skin Disease Virus revealed LSDV017, a protein that shows weak evidence of sequence homology to cellular members of the Bcl-2 family. However, LSDV017 showed a significant level of similarity between members of the poxvirus family. In addition, the model of LSDV017 was examined to determine the presence of hydrophobic surface groove and the result revealed the presence of a potential hydrophobic pocket formed by Tyr46, Phe50, Ile53 and Ala90. Given the low level of sequence similarity, the aim was to determine whether LSDV017 shows anti-apoptotic activity against the pro-survival members of the Bcl-2 family. By performing a yeast cell death assay experiment, in the absence of all other cellular Bcl-2 protein, anti-apoptotic activity of LSDV017 was confirmed. Here, it was reported that LSDV017 was able to inhibit apoptosis induced by Bak and no protection was observed against Bax. The achieved results from homology modelling and yeast cell death assay studies suggest that LSDV017 is a novel anti-apoptotic protein and might adopt a Bcl-2 like fold.