Protein / target
Acetyl-coenzyme A synthetase, cytoplasmic
Protein at a glance
Biological role
Transcription coactivator
Strongest disease association
Angina Pectoris
Research activity
Emerging research
Derived from structured UniProt, Open Targets and literature data on this page.
Protein profile
Canonical identity and biological annotation from UniProt.
Function overview
Catalyzes the synthesis of acetyl-CoA from short-chain fatty acids.
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Catalyzes the synthesis of acetyl-CoA from short-chain fatty acids (PubMed:10843999, PubMed:28003429, PubMed:28552616, PubMed:38369012, PubMed:39561764). Acetate is the preferred substrate (PubMed:10843999, PubMed:28003429, PubMed:38369012, PubMed:39561764). Can also utilize propionate with a much lower affinity (PubMed:38369012). Catalyzes the conversion of lactate into lactoyl-CoA (PubMed:39561764). Does not catalyze the conversion of butyrate or crotonate to their corresponding acyl-CoAs (PubMed:38369012). Nuclear ACSS2 promotes glucose deprivation-induced lysosomal biogenesis and autophagy, tumor cell survival and brain tumorigenesis (PubMed:28552616). Glucose deprivation results in AMPK-mediated phosphorylation of ACSS2 leading to its translocation to the nucleus where it binds to TFEB and locally produces acetyl-CoA for histone acetylation in the promoter regions of TFEB target genes thereby activating their transcription (PubMed:28552616). The regulation of genes associated with autophagy and lysosomal activity through ACSS2 is important for brain tumorigenesis and tumor survival (PubMed:28552616). Acts as a chromatin-bound transcriptional coactivator that up-regulates histone acetylation and expression of neuronal genes (By similarity). Can be recruited to the loci of memory-related neuronal genes to maintain a local acetyl-CoA pool, providing the substrate for histone acetylation and promoting the expression of specific genes, which is essential for maintaining long-term spatial memory (By similarity)
Subcellular location
Domains and Gene Ontology detail (19)Hide
Gene Ontology
- Ccytoplasm
- Ccytosol
- Cmitochondrial matrix
- Cnucleoplasm
- Cnucleus
- Facetate-CoA ligase activity
- FAMP binding
- FATP binding
- Fchromatin binding
- Fpropionate-CoA ligase activity
- Ftranscription coactivator activity
- Pacetate biosynthetic process
Biological roles
What this protein does, drawn together from its UniProt function, Gene Ontology terms and Reactome pathways.
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Cell proliferation & survival
- ·Catalyzes the synthesis of acetyl-CoA from short-chain fatty acids (PubMed:10843999, Pub…
Oncogenic signalling
- ·Catalyzes the synthesis of acetyl-CoA from short-chain fatty acids (PubMed:10843999, Pub…
Lipid & lipoprotein metabolism
- ·Catalyzes the synthesis of acetyl-CoA from short-chain fatty acids (PubMed:10843999, Pub…
Transcriptional regulation
- ·Catalyzes the synthesis of acetyl-CoA from short-chain fatty acids (PubMed:10843999, Pub…
- ·transcription coactivator activity
- ·DNA-templated transcription
Concepts derived from UniProt GO Reactome — each badge above shows which sources supported that role.
Translational evidence
Why this target matters therapeutically, strongest evidence first. Disease associations are gene-level (via the gene that encodes this protein) and open into the full confidence synthesis; the development universe, tractability and safety annotations are target-level, from Open Targets.
Strongest disease associations · via encoding gene ACSS2
Gene-level evidence surfaced through the gene ACSS2 that encodes this protein — not a direct protein–disease relationship. Ranked by Forefront's causal-directness weighting, so genetically- and clinically-evidenced diseases lead over ones that merely share the literature.
View evidence synthesis (5)Hide
This ranking differs from Open Targets' own: re-weighting moves genetically-evidenced diseases above more heavily co-mentioned ones. The evidence agreement range shows how closely the independent evidence families agree — it is not a statistical confidence interval, and nothing here is fitted to outcome data. Derived from Open Targets evidence types under Forefront weighting; the per-type scores above show the calculation.
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Tractability
Small molecules — Emerging
Protein degraders — Emerging
View underlying tractability evidence (4)Hide
Raw Open Targets tractability assessment buckets, by modality.
Safety-related annotations
Terms indexed against this target in Open Targets' safety data, with their datasource. These are annotations, not causal claims: the direction of effect (whether activation or inhibition is implicated), species and evidence strength are not captured here, so an entry does not mean that modulating this target is known to cause that condition.
Research activity
Papers linked directly to this protein. This is the protein's own literature — descriptor-derived papers are kept separate below.
Most cited
Recent
Europe PMC papers linked directly to this protein.