Abstract
In the past decade or so, there has been a quiet revolution in the field of cell signaling. An elusive target finally yielded its secrets: in 2007, the first atomic structure of a GPCR was determined. GPCRs (G-protein-coupled receptors) sit in the membranes of cells throughout our bodies and pass messages inside to G proteins. They’ve been a particularly hard nut to crack because they are smallish proteins, most of which is buried in the membrane. The small bits that extend on either side of the membrane don’t provide much leverage for forming crystals, so they eluded crystallography for many years.
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© 2016 Springer International Publishing Switzerland
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Goodsell, D.S. (2016). GPCRs Revealed. In: Atomic Evidence. Copernicus, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-32510-1_15
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-32510-1_15
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Publisher Name: Copernicus, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-32508-8
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-32510-1
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