Clinical studies have suggested an association between the drug metformin and a reduction or control of tumors in diabetes 2 mellitus patients, but the lack of noninvasive research methods have interrupted further progress in the investigation of this potential side effect of the drug. Metformin is a vastly used drug to decrease glucose production, however its’ mechanism of action is still controversial.
The drug enters the cell through an OCT membrane transporter, and studies …show more content…
This means finding proteins that express affinity and specificity for the respective ligand. According to Ewald (2011) there are three good options, CitX (periplasmic binding protein from Salmonella typhimurium) and the binding domains of DpiB (sensor histidine kinase from E. coli) and CitA (sensor histidine kinase from Klebsiella pneumoniae). We would then purify all three proteins and record fluorescence energy values when bound to citrate for future reference. It is also crucial to test the purified proteins affinity against pyruvate and other citric acid cycle metabolites such as succinate and α-ketoglutarate, to prevent false positive results from occurring (Ewald,