Science Spotlight: Platelets as targeted protein degraders 

University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers reported in Nature Biotechnology a method to engineer platelets to induce degradation of target proteins at hemorrhagic sites.

The authors covalently tethered ligands that bound proteins of interest to the molecular chaperone HSP90 within platelets. These degrader platelets, dubbed DePLTs, selectively accumulated at wound sites and released platelet-derived microparticles carrying the HSP90 conjugates, which entered the cytoplasm of target cells by membrane fusion and degraded intracellular target proteins using the ubiquitin-proteasome system. DePLTs also released HSP90 conjugates into the extracellular space, redirecting extracellular target proteins for lysosomal degradation...