Enzyme engineering opens door to novel therapies for Parkinson's, cancers and other hard-to-target protein diseases

Scientists have long struggled to target proteins that lack defined structure and are involved in cancer, neurodegenerative disorders like Parkinson's disease, and other serious illnesses. Now, a new study demonstrates a proof of concept for a new strategy: engineering proteases -- enzymes that cut proteins at specific sites -- to selectively degrade these elusive targets with high precision in the proteome of human cells.