Comprehensive analysis on Wnt signaling pathway to develop a novel signal modifier

Wnt signals play a key role in organ formation and function. Abnormalities in organ function or genetic diseases and carcinogenesis could point to issues with these signals, they are therefore an effective target for drug delivery. Dr Yuki Ikebuchi, Department of Pharmacy, The University of Tokyo Hospital, Japan, is heading up a team of researchers working to shed greater light on the Wnt signalling pathway. This will facilitate the development and delivery of more targeted drug therapies, helping patients. One element of Ikebuchi’s research is a detailed analysis on the Wnt signalling pathway to develop a novel signal modifier. As previous studies have found that Wnt molecules exert their physiological activities through glycosylation and lipid modification, a possible method to input signals downstream of the Wnt-Fzd complex is to crosslink and interact with Fzd molecules or co-receptors using antibody-like molecules. The researchers sought to obtain high-definition signal activation profiles of 10 types of Fzd molecules; something that hasn't been done before. At first, the team established the cell line, derived from mouse osteoblast-like MC3T3-E1 cells, in which endogenously expressed all Fzd and co-receptor genese were knocked out using CRISPR-Cas9 system. And then, they used adenoviruses containing the gene sequences of Wnt, Fzd and the co-receptor to transiently express them in knocked-out cells. The researchers will assess the resulting activation of downstream pathways by Luciferase assays using various reporter sequences. They will adopt a dual-glo assay that can correct the gene transfer efficiency and further enhance accuracy using NanoLuc.