Abstract
Two members of the TULA family (TULA/STS-2/UBASH3A and TULA-2/STS-1/UBASH3B) recently emerged as novel regulators of several cellular functions. The degree of structural similarity between the TULA-family proteins is typical for proteins that belong to the same family. Furthermore, the experiments with knockout mice lacking these proteins may be interpreted as suggesting that functions of TULA-family proteins in T lymphocytes overlap. At the same time, TULA and TULA-2 exhibit clear functional dissimilarities, starting with the finding that a conserved phosphatase domain present in both proteins exhibits remarkable differences in enzymatic activity; TULA-2 is an active phosphatase capable of dephosphorylating multiple tyrosine-phosphorylated proteins, whereas the phosphatase activity of TULA is extremely low. In contrast, TULA, but not TULA-2, facilitates growth factor withdrawal-induced apoptosis in T cells. In spite of their apparent importance, the functional role of TULA-family proteins is not well understood. In particular, the role of functional dissimilarities between them remains unclear.
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Acknowledgment
I would like to express my deepest gratitude to Nick Carpino for insightful discussions.
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Tsygankov, A.Y. TULA-family proteins: an odd couple. Cell. Mol. Life Sci. 66, 2949–2952 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00018-009-0071-x
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00018-009-0071-x