%0 Journal Article
%A Olombrada Sacristán, Miriam
%A Herrero Galán, Elías
%A Tello, Daniel
%A Oñaderra Sánchez, Mercedes
%A Gavilanes, José G.
%A Martinez del Pozo, Álvaro
%A García Ortega, Lucía
%T Fungal extracellular ribotoxins as insecticidal agents
%D 2013
%U https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14352/42529
%X Fungal ribotoxins were discovered almost 50 years ago as extracellular ribonucleases (RNases) with antitumoral properties. However, the biological function of these toxic proteins has remained elusive. The discovery of theribotoxin HtA, produced by the invertebrates pathogen H. thompsonii, revived the old proposal that insecticidal activity would be their long searched function.Unfortunately, HtA is rather singular among all ribotoxins known in terms of sequence and structure similarities. Thus, it was intriguing to answer the question of whether HtA is just an exception or, on the contrary, theparadigmatic example of the ribotoxins function. The work presented uses HtA and -sarcin, the most representative member of the ribotoxins family, to show their strong toxic action against insect larvae and cells.
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