Asyn

"ELI10: Asyn is an abbreviation for alpha-synuclein, a protein that is found in the nervous system at the tip of neurons and just inside neuron's cell membranes. In some diseases like Parkinson's, these proteins are folded the "wrong way" and become sticky. Not surprisingly, our now-sticky asyn proteins clump together. These clumps are now called "Lewy bodies", and are very commonly found in people with Parkinson's disease especially in areas of their brains with lots of neuronal death."https://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/czbpgx/a_theory_that_parkinsons_disease_can_arise_in_the/eyxouyk/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=web2x&context=3KingTetroseWang1 year agoImagine a knot tied from a rope: take the rope, tie the knot. Now you have a knot with a specific shape and function. That's how proteins work: an amino acid chain (rope) is folded (tied) into higher order structures that have specific functions (knots).Alpha-synuclein ("asyn" in the paper because acronyms streamline text and confuse people from other departments, decreasing the likelihood of their encroachment into your funding stream) is a protein probably involved in building the docking rope-and-pulley system (vesicles, SNAREs) involved in moving neurotransmitters (e.g. dopamine) from the production (soma) to the shipping department (presynaptic terminal) of a neuron.Sometimes, proteins tangle up, like headphones in your pocket. And like knotted headphones in your pocket, these tangles are difficult to untangle and disrupt the normal function. What's worse: we think these tangles are "contagious": if one asyn tangles and touches a normally knotted asyn, the normal one will tangle itself and stick to the other abnormal one.This process snowballs until you get an aggregation of misfolded asyn, which comprise the bulk of these microscopically visible hunks of junk in tissues. These hunks are called 'Lewy bodies'./https://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/czbpgx/a_theory_that_parkinsons_disease_can_arise_in_the/eyxoxha/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=web2x&context=3
Misfolding
"It being contagious makes sense since if one pair of headphones in your pocket will tangle, imagine the mess multiple pairs will make."Protein misfolding labs can be diverse. Lots of overlap between many different departments. Some do kinetic modeling, in vitro work, in vivo with animal and cell models, etc. Biochemistry, Chemistry, Neuroscience, Pharmacology, Chemical engineering (chemical kinetics applies to systems like these), etc.
== Rh ==
A, Syn; Synchro; Synchronic;
Synarchy; Synergy; Synthesis