We offer a PhD Student Position on Citrullination in ischemia/reperfusion injury: identifying new therapeutic targets and biomarkers
This project focuses on the impact of citrullination during ischemia/reperfusion injury using state-of-the-art in vitro systems and large animal models.
Protein citrullination is a widespread post-translational modification catalyzed by a family of enzymes, the peptidyl arginine deiminases (PADs). The conversion of arginine to citrulline causes a loss of charge that can have profound effects on protein structure and function. Recently, others and we have shown that release of PAD, in particular PAD4, in the extracellular environment can have deleterious effects and lead to citrullination of plasma proteins. In fact, dysregulation of citrullination and PAD activity has been linked to numerous diseases including thrombosis, rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis, various cancers, and likely plays key roles in ischemia reperfusion injury.