Background:

Dansylcadaverine is a fluorescent probe.

Detection of Dansylcadaverine fluorescence after SDS-PAGE shows that the amount of actin-thymosin β4 crosslink is very low in the presence of Dansylcadaverine and transglutaminase, while there are large amounts of Dansylcadaverine-labeled thymosin β4 and actin. The amount of cross-link further decreases in the presence of Dansylcadaverine competing for Lys residues of either G-actin or thymosin β4 (100 μM). In the absence of thymosin β4, Dansylcadaverine-labeled actin polymerized to F-actin as revealed by fluorescence detection after native PAGE[1].

[1]. Huff T, et al. Thymosin beta(4) serves as a glutaminyl substrate of transglutaminase. Labeling with fluorescentdansylcadaverine does not abolish interaction with G-actin. FEBS Lett. 1999 Dec 24;464(1-2):14-20. [2]. Laha D, et al. Interplay between autophagy and apoptosis mediated by copper oxide nanoparticles in human breast cancer cells MCF7. Biochim Biophys Acta. 2014 Jan;1840(1):1-9.