Unraveling new functions of superoxide dismutase using yeast model system: Beyond its conventional role in superoxide radical scavenging

• Published in: The journal of microbiology 2017, 55(6), , pp.409-416
• Main Author: Chung, Woo-Hyun
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Anaerobic bacteria; Antioxidants; Antioxidants - metabolism; Bacteria; Baking yeast; Biomedical and Life Sciences; Budding; Crosstalk; Deoxyribonucleic acid; DNA; DNA damage; DNA repair; Glucose metabolism; Isoforms; Life Sciences; Mathematical models; Metabolism; Microbiology; Minireview; Nucleic acids; Organic chemistry; Oxidative stress; Oxidative Stress - physiology; Protein Isoforms; Proteins; Reactive Oxygen Species - metabolism; Ribonucleic acid; RNA; RNA-binding protein; RNA-Binding Proteins - metabolism; Saccharomyces cerevisiae; Saccharomyces cerevisiae - enzymology; Saccharomyces cerevisiae - metabolism; Superoxide dismutase; Superoxide Dismutase-1 - metabolism; Transcription; Transcription Factors; Viability; Yeast; Yeasts; 생물학
• ISSN: 1225-8873; 1976-3794
• DOI: 10.1007/s12275-017-6647-5

To deal with chemically reactive oxygen molecules constantly threatening aerobic life, cells are readily equipped with elaborate biological antioxidant systems. Superoxide dismutase is a metalloenzyme catalytically eliminating superoxide radical as a first-line defense mechanism against oxidative stress. Multiple different SOD isoforms have been developed throughout evolution to play distinct roles in separate subcellular compartments. SOD is not essential for viability of most aerobic organisms and intriguingly found even in strictly anaerobic bacteria. Sod1 has recently been known to play important roles as a nuclear transcription factor, an RNA binding protein, a synthetic lethal interactor, and a signal modulator in glucose metabolism, most of which are independent of its canonical function as an antioxidant enzyme. In this review, recent advances in understanding the unconventional role of Sod1 are highlighted and discussed with an emphasis on its genetic crosstalk with DNA damage repair/checkpoint pathways. The budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae has been successfully used as an efficient tool and a model organism to investigate a number of novel functions of Sod1.