Interactive JIMD articles using the iSee concept: turning a new page on structural biology data

MichelaNglo: sculpting protein views on web pages without coding

MOTIVATION

The sharing of macromolecular structural information online by scientists is predominantly performed via 2D static images, since the embedding of interactive 3D structures in webpages is non-trivial. Whilst the technologies to do so exist, they are often only implementable with significant web coding experience.

RESULTS

Michelaɴɢʟo is an accessible and open-source web-based application that supports the generation, customization and sharing of interactive 3D macromolecular visualizations for digital media without requiring programming skills. A PyMOL file, PDB file, PDB identifier code or protein/gene name can be provided to form the basis of visualizations using the NGL JavaScript library. Hyperlinks that control the view can be added to text within the page. Protein-coding variants can be highlighted to support interpretation of their potential functional consequences. The resulting visualizations and text can be customized and shared, as well as embedded within existing websites by following instructions and using a self-contained download. Michelaɴɢʟo allows researchers to move away from static images and instead engage, describe and explain their protein to a wider audience in a more interactive fashion.

AVAILABILITY AND IMPLEMENTATION

Michelaɴɢʟo is hosted at michelanglo.sgc.ox.ac.uk. The Python code is freely available at https://github.com/thesgc/MichelaNGLo, along with documentations about its implementation.

Crystallographic and electrophilic fragment screening of the SARS-CoV-2 main protease

COVID-19, caused by SARS-CoV-2, lacks effective therapeutics. Additionally, no antiviral drugs or vaccines were developed against the closely related coronavirus, SARS-CoV-1 or MERS-CoV, despite previous zoonotic outbreaks. To identify starting points for such therapeutics, we performed a large-scale screen of electrophile and non-covalent fragments through a combined mass spectrometry and X-ray approach against the SARS-CoV-2 main protease, one of two cysteine viral proteases essential for viral replication. Our crystallographic screen identified 71 hits that span the entire active site, as well as 3 hits at the dimer interface. These structures reveal routes to rapidly develop more potent inhibitors through merging of covalent and non-covalent fragment hits; one series of low-reactivity, tractable covalent fragments were progressed to discover improved binders. These combined hits offer unprecedented structural and reactivity information for on-going structure-based drug design against SARS-CoV-2 main protease.

The role of protein structural analysis in the next generation sequencing era

Proteins are macromolecules that serve a cell’s myriad processes and functions in all living organisms via dynamic interactions with other proteins, small molecules and cellular components. Genetic variations in the protein-encoding regions of the human genome account for >85% of all known Mendelian diseases, and play an influential role in shaping complex polygenic diseases. Proteins also serve as the predominant target class for the design of small molecule drugs to modulate their activity. Knowledge of the shape and form of proteins, by means of their three-dimensional structures, is therefore instrumental to understanding their roles in disease and their potentials for drug development. In this chapter we outline, with the wide readership of non-structural biologists in mind, the various experimental and computational methods available for protein structure determination. We summarize how the wealth of structure information, contributed to a large extent by the technological advances in structure determination to date, serves as a useful tool to decipher the molecular basis of genetic variations for disease characterization and diagnosis, particularly in the emerging era of genomic medicine, and becomes an integral component in the modern day approach towards rational drug development.

PeptiSite: a structural database of peptide binding sites in 4D

We developed PeptiSite, a comprehensive and reliable database of biologically and structurally characterized peptide-binding sites, in which each site is represented by an ensemble of its complexes with protein, peptide and small molecule partners. The unique features of the database include: (1) the ensemble site representation that provides a fourth dimension to the otherwise three dimensional data, (2) comprehensive characterization of the binding site architecture that may consist of a multimeric protein assembly with cofactors and metal ions and (3) analysis of consensus interaction motifs within the ensembles and identification of conserved determinants of these interactions. Currently the database contains 585 proteins with 650 peptide-binding sites. http://peptisite.ucsd.edu/ link allows searching for the sites of interest and interactive visualization of the ensembles using the ActiveICM web-browser plugin. This structural database for protein-peptide interactions enables understanding of structural principles of these interactions and may assist the development of an efficient peptide docking benchmark.

Pocketome: an encyclopedia of small-molecule binding sites in 4D

The importance of binding site plasticity in protein-ligand interactions is well-recognized, and so are the difficulties in predicting the nature and the degree of this plasticity by computational means. To assist in understanding the flexible protein-ligand interactions, we constructed the Pocketome, an encyclopedia of about one thousand experimentally solved conformational ensembles of druggable binding sites in proteins, grouped by location and consistent chain/cofactor composition. The multiplicity of pockets within the ensembles adds an extra, fourth dimension to the Pocketome entry data. Within each ensemble, the pockets were carefully classified by the degree of their pairwise similarity and compatibility with different ligands. The core of the Pocketome is derived regularly and automatically from the current releases of the Protein Data Bank and the Uniprot Knowledgebase; this core is complemented by entries built from manually provided seed ligand locations. The Pocketome website (www.pocketome.org) allows searching for the sites of interest, analysis of conformational clusters, important residues, binding compatibility matrices and interactive visualization of the ensembles using the ActiveICM web browser plugin. The Pocketome collection can be used to build multi-conformational docking and 3D activity models as well as to design cross-docking and virtual ligand screening benchmarks.