Minions are necessary for myogenesis

The new microbreaker was named after the minions

Oleg Lischuk, N+1

American scientists have discovered a micro protein necessary for the formation of muscle tissue. It was named after the minions – the characters of the animated film of the same name.

The results of the work are published in the journal Nature Communications (Zhang et al., The microprotein Minion controls cell fusion and muscle formation).

In recent years, a new class of mammalian genes has been discovered, called the small open reading frame (smORF). They are transcribed and translated in the usual way, but their peptide products, as a rule, do not exceed the size of 100 amino acids, which is why they were called micro-proteins. Their functions as a whole remain unknown. Several of the known mammalian micro-proteins are found in muscle tissue.

The staff of the Institute of Genomics of the Novartis Research Foundation conducted a search for micro-proteins that presumably play a key role in the formation of skeletal muscles. To do this, they performed a complete analysis of the transcriptome of a mouse muscle recovering from damage in vitro, paying special attention to SMORFS, the expression of which is triggered by the formation of muscle fibers. The central place in this process is occupied by the differentiation of progenitor cells (myoblasts) and their fusion with the formation of a multinucleated fibrous myosymplast - the main component of muscle fiber.

The analysis revealed a micro-protein encoded by the gm7325 gene, which is absent in whole muscles, but begins to be synthesized when they are damaged, and the peak of its synthesis occurs on the third or fourth day from the moment of injury. Immunofluorescence analysis showed that the same micro protein is synthesized during embryonic development, especially during periods of active skeletal muscle formation.

Further analysis showed that the gm7325 gene product is located on the membrane of myoblasts and participates in their fusion during the formation of myosymplast. In genetically modified mice deprived of this gene, the process of muscle fiber formation was disrupted, which is why such animals died during childbirth or immediately after due to underdevelopment of the respiratory muscles.

Violation of the formation of skeletal muscles in the absence of a micro-minion (bottom)
in a mouse embryo. A snapshot from an article in Nature Communications.

Having found out the function of the micro protein, which is a small but necessary peptide, scientists decided to name it and the gene encoding it Minion (Minion, from the English microprotein inducer of fusion - micro protein fusion inducer) in honor of the heroes of the animated film of the same name.

"We are fans of this movie and this protein. They have a lot in common," explained the author of the study, Srihari Sampath.

This is not the first time biomolecules have been named after animated characters. Other examples are sonic hedgehog, named after Sonic the Hedgehog, a regulator of the formation of organs (mainly limbs and brain) in the embryonic development of animals, as well as pikachurin, a retinal protein named after the pokemon Pikachu.

Portal "Eternal youth" http://vechnayamolodost.ru  05.06.2017