1
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Li Y, Yang L, Yang LQ. Effects of intrinsically disordered regions in gp120 underlying HIV neutralization phenotypes. Biochem Biophys Res Commun 2024; 709:149830. [PMID: 38547606 DOI: 10.1016/j.bbrc.2024.149830] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/30/2024] [Revised: 03/18/2024] [Accepted: 03/24/2024] [Indexed: 04/13/2024]
Abstract
HIV envelope protein gp120 is considered a primary molecular determinant of viral neutralization phenotype due to its critical role in viral entry and immune evasion. The intrinsically disordered regions (IDRs) in gp120 are responsible for their extensive sequence variations and significant structural rearrangements. Despite HIV neutralization phenotype and sequence/structural information of gp120 have been experimentally characterized, there remains a gap in our understanding of the correlation between the viral phenotype and IDRs in gp120. Here, we combined machine learning (ML) techniques and molecular dynamics (MD) simulations to gain data-driven and molecule-mechanism insights into relationships between viral sequence, structure, and phenotypes from the perspective of IDRs in gp120. ML models, trained only on the length and disorder score of IDRs, achieved equivalent performance to the best baseline model using amino acid sequences to discriminate HIV neutralization phenotype, indicating that the lengths or disorder of specific IDRs are strongly related to HIV neutralization phenotypes. Comparative MD analysis reveals that gp120 with extreme neutralization phenotypes in multiple conformational states, especially some IDRs, exhibit significantly distinct structural dynamics, conformational flexibility, and thermodynamic distributions. Taken together, our study provided insights into the role of IDRs in gp120 responding to HIV neutralization phenotypes, which will advance the understanding of molecular mechanisms underlying viral function associated with HIV neutralization phenotype and help develop antiviral vaccines or drugs.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yi Li
- College of Mathematics and Computer Science, Dali University, Dali, China
| | - Li Yang
- College of Mathematics and Computer Science, Dali University, Dali, China
| | - Li-Quan Yang
- College of Agriculture and Biological Science, Dali University, Dali, China; Key Laboratory of Bioinformatics and Computational Biology, Department of Education of Yunnan Province, Dali University, Dali, China.
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2
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Gogishvili D, Illes-Toth E, Harris MJ, Hopley C, Teunissen CE, Abeln S. Structural flexibility and heterogeneity of recombinant human glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP). Proteins 2024; 92:649-664. [PMID: 38149328 DOI: 10.1002/prot.26656] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/04/2023] [Revised: 12/07/2023] [Accepted: 12/12/2023] [Indexed: 12/28/2023]
Abstract
Glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP) is a promising biomarker for brain and spinal cord disorders. Recent studies have highlighted the differences in the reliability of GFAP measurements in different biological matrices. The reason for these discrepancies is poorly understood as our knowledge of the protein's 3-dimensional conformation, proteoforms, and aggregation remains limited. Here, we investigate the structural properties of GFAP under different conditions. For this, we characterized recombinant GFAP proteins from various suppliers and applied hydrogen-deuterium exchange mass spectrometry (HDX-MS) to provide a snapshot of the conformational dynamics of GFAP in artificial cerebrospinal fluid (aCSF) compared to the phosphate buffer. Our findings indicate that recombinant GFAP exists in various conformational species. Furthermore, we show that GFAP dimers remained intact under denaturing conditions. HDX-MS experiments show an overall decrease in H-bonding and an increase in solvent accessibility of GFAP in aCSF compared to the phosphate buffer, with clear indications of mixed EX2 and EX1 kinetics. To understand possible structural interface regions and the evolutionary conservation profiles, we combined HDX-MS results with the predicted GFAP-dimer structure by AlphaFold-Multimer. We found that deprotected regions with high structural flexibility in aCSF overlap with predicted conserved dimeric 1B and 2B domain interfaces. Structural property predictions combined with the HDX data show an overall deprotection and signatures of aggregation in aCSF. We anticipate that the outcomes of this research will contribute to a deeper understanding of the structural flexibility of GFAP and ultimately shed light on its behavior in different biological matrices.
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Affiliation(s)
- Dea Gogishvili
- Bioinformatics, Computer Science Department, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
- AI Technology for Life, Department of Computing and Information Sciences, Department of Biology, Utrecht University, Utrecht, The Netherlands
| | - Eva Illes-Toth
- National Measurement Laboratory at Laboratory of the Government Chemist (LGC), Teddington, UK
| | - Matthew J Harris
- National Measurement Laboratory at Laboratory of the Government Chemist (LGC), Teddington, UK
| | - Christopher Hopley
- National Measurement Laboratory at Laboratory of the Government Chemist (LGC), Teddington, UK
| | - Charlotte E Teunissen
- Amsterdam Neuroscience, Neurodegeneration, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
- Neurochemistry Laboratory, Department of Clinical Chemistry, Amsterdam Neuroscience, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam UMC, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
| | - Sanne Abeln
- Bioinformatics, Computer Science Department, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
- AI Technology for Life, Department of Computing and Information Sciences, Department of Biology, Utrecht University, Utrecht, The Netherlands
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3
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Pereira de Araújo AF. Sequence-dependent and -independent information in a combined random energy model for protein folding and coding. Proteins 2024; 92:679-687. [PMID: 38158239 DOI: 10.1002/prot.26658] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/07/2023] [Revised: 12/11/2023] [Accepted: 12/15/2023] [Indexed: 01/03/2024]
Abstract
Random energy models (REMs) provide a simple description of the energy landscapes that guide protein folding and evolution. The requirement of a large energy gap between the native structure and unfolded conformations, considered necessary for cooperative, protein-like, folding behavior, indicates that proteins differ markedly from random heteropolymers. It has been suggested, therefore, that natural selection might have acted to choose nonrandom amino acid sequences satisfying this particular condition, implying that a large fraction of possible, unselected random sequences, would not fold to any structure. From an informational perspective, however, this scenario could indicate that protein structures, regarded as messages to be transmitted through a communication channel, would not be efficiently encoded in amino acid sequences, regarded as the communication channel for this transmission, since a large fraction of possible channel states would not be used. Here, we use a combined REM for conformations and sequences, with previously estimated parameters for natural proteins, to explore an alternative possibility in which the appropriate shape of the landscape results mainly from the deviation from randomness of possible native structures instead of sequences. We observe that this situation emerges naturally if the distribution of conformational energies happens to arise from two independent contributions corresponding to sequence-dependent and -independent terms. This construction is consistent with the hypothesis of a protein burial folding code, with native structures being determined by a modest amount of sequence-dependent atomic burial information with sequence-independent constraints imposed by unspecific hydrogen bond formation. More generally, an appropriate combination of sequence-dependent and -independent information accommodates the possibility of an efficient structural encoding with the main physical requirement for folding, providing possible insight not only on the folding process but also on several aspects sequence evolution such as neutral networks, conformational coverage, and de novo gene emergence.
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Affiliation(s)
- Antônio F Pereira de Araújo
- Laboratório de Biofísica Teórica, Departamento de Biologia Celular, Universidade de Brasília, Brasília, Brazil
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4
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Voeten RLC, Majeed HA, Bos TS, Somsen GW, Haselberg R. Investigating direct current potentials that affect native protein conformation during trapped ion mobility spectrometry-mass spectrometry. J Mass Spectrom 2024; 59:e5021. [PMID: 38605451 DOI: 10.1002/jms.5021] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/07/2023] [Revised: 10/13/2023] [Accepted: 03/06/2024] [Indexed: 04/13/2024]
Abstract
Trapped ion mobility spectrometry-time-of-flight mass spectrometry (TIMS-TOFMS) has emerged as a tool to study protein conformational states. In TIMS, gas-phase ions are guided across the IM stages by applying direct current (DC) potentials (D1-6), which, however, might induce changes in protein structures through collisional activation. To define conditions for native protein analysis, we evaluated the influence of these DC potentials using the metalloenzyme bovine carbonic anhydrase (BCA) as primary test compound. The variation of DC potentials did not change BCA-ion charge and heme content but affected (relative) charge-state intensities and adduct retention. Constructed extracted-ion mobilograms and corresponding collisional cross-section (CCS) profiles gave useful insights in (alterations of) protein conformational state. For BCA, the D3 and D6 potential (which are applied between the deflection transfer and funnel 1 [F1] and the accumulation exit and the start of the ramp, respectively) had most profound effects, showing multimodal CCS distributions at higher potentials indicating gradual unfolding. The other DC potentials only marginally altered the CCS profiles of BCA. To allow for more general conclusions, five additional proteins of diverse molecular weight and conformational stability were analyzed, and for the main protein charge states, CCS profiles were constructed. Principal component analysis (PCA) of the obtained data showed that D1 and D3 exhibit the highest degree of correlation with the ratio of folded and unfolded protein (F/U) as extracted from the mobilograms obtained per set D potential. The correlation of D6 with F/U and protein charge were similar, and D2, D4, and D5 showed an inverse correlation with F/U but were correlated with protein charge. Although DC boundary values for induced conformational changes appeared protein dependent, a set of DC values could be determined, which assured native analysis of most proteins.
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Affiliation(s)
- Robert L C Voeten
- Division of BioAnalytical Chemistry, Department of Chemistry and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Amsterdam Institute of Molecular and Life Sciences (AIMMS), Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
- Centre for Analytical Sciences Amsterdam (CASA), Amsterdam, The Netherlands
- TI-COAST, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
| | - Hany A Majeed
- Division of BioAnalytical Chemistry, Department of Chemistry and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Amsterdam Institute of Molecular and Life Sciences (AIMMS), Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
- Centre for Analytical Sciences Amsterdam (CASA), Amsterdam, The Netherlands
| | - Tijmen S Bos
- Division of BioAnalytical Chemistry, Department of Chemistry and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Amsterdam Institute of Molecular and Life Sciences (AIMMS), Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
- Centre for Analytical Sciences Amsterdam (CASA), Amsterdam, The Netherlands
| | - Govert W Somsen
- Division of BioAnalytical Chemistry, Department of Chemistry and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Amsterdam Institute of Molecular and Life Sciences (AIMMS), Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
- Centre for Analytical Sciences Amsterdam (CASA), Amsterdam, The Netherlands
| | - Rob Haselberg
- Division of BioAnalytical Chemistry, Department of Chemistry and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Amsterdam Institute of Molecular and Life Sciences (AIMMS), Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
- Centre for Analytical Sciences Amsterdam (CASA), Amsterdam, The Netherlands
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5
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Yoshidome T. Four-dimensional imaging for cryo-electron microscopy experiments using molecular simulations and manifold learning. J Comput Chem 2024; 45:738-751. [PMID: 38112413 DOI: 10.1002/jcc.27290] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/30/2023] [Revised: 11/20/2023] [Accepted: 12/01/2023] [Indexed: 12/21/2023]
Abstract
Elucidating protein conformational changes is essential because conformational changes are closely related to the functions of proteins. Cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM) experiment can be used to reconstruct protein conformational changes via a method that involves using the experimental data (two-dimensional protein images). In this study, a reconstruction method, referred to as the "four-dimensional imaging," was proposed. In our four-dimensional imaging technique, the protein conformational change was obtained using the two-dimensional protein images (the three-dimensional electron density maps used in previously proposed techniques were not used). The protein conformation for each two-dimensional protein image was obtained using our original protocol with molecular dynamics simulations. Using a manifold-learning technique and two-dimensional protein images, the protein conformations were arranged according to the conformational change of the protein. By arranging the protein conformations according to the arrangement of the protein images, four-dimensional imaging is constructed. A simulation for a cryo-EM experiment demonstrated the validity of our four-dimensional imaging technique.
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Affiliation(s)
- Takashi Yoshidome
- Department of Applied Physics, Graduate School of Engineering, Tohoku University, Sendai, Japan
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6
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Saikia B, Baruah A. In silico design of misfolding resistant proteins: the role of structural similarity of a competing conformational ensemble in the optimization of frustration. Soft Matter 2024; 20:3283-3298. [PMID: 38529658 DOI: 10.1039/d4sm00171k] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 03/27/2024]
Abstract
Most state-of-the-art in silico design methods fail due to misfolding of designed sequences to a conformation other than the target. Thus, a method to design misfolding resistant proteins will provide a better understanding of the misfolding phenomenon and will also increase the success rate of in silico design methods. In this work, we optimize the conformational ensemble to be selected for negative design purposes based on the similarity of the conformational ensemble to the target. Five ensembles with different degrees of similarity to the target are created and destabilized and the target is stabilized while designing sequences using mean field theory and Monte Carlo simulation methods. The results suggest that the degree of similarity of the non-native conformations to the target plays a prominent role in designing misfolding resistant protein sequences. The design procedures that destabilize the conformational ensemble with moderate similarity to the target have proven to be more promising. Incorporation of either highly similar or highly dissimilar conformations to the target conformation into the non-native ensemble to be destabilized may lead to sequences with a higher misfolding propensity. This will significantly reduce the conformational space to be considered in any protein design procedure. Interestingly, the results suggest that a sequence with higher frustration in the target structure does not necessarily lead to a misfold prone sequence. A successful design method may purposefully choose a frustrated sequence in the target conformation if that sequence is even more frustrated in the competing non-native conformations.
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Affiliation(s)
- Bondeepa Saikia
- Department of Chemistry, Dibrugarh University, Dibrugarh 786004, India.
| | - Anupaul Baruah
- Department of Chemistry, Dibrugarh University, Dibrugarh 786004, India.
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7
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Marinelli F, Faraldo-Gómez JD. Conformational free-energy landscapes of a Na +/Ca 2+ exchanger explain its alternating-access mechanism and functional specificity. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 2024; 121:e2318009121. [PMID: 38588414 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2318009121] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/25/2023] [Accepted: 02/20/2024] [Indexed: 04/10/2024] Open
Abstract
Secondary-active transporters catalyze the movement of myriad substances across all cellular membranes, typically against opposing concentration gradients, and without consuming any ATP. To do so, these proteins employ an intriguing structural mechanism evolved to be activated only upon recognition or release of the transported species. We examine this self-regulated mechanism using a homolog of the cardiac Na+/Ca2+ exchanger as a model system. Using advanced computer simulations, we map out the complete functional cycle of this transporter, including unknown conformations that we validate against existing experimental data. Calculated free-energy landscapes reveal why this transporter functions as an antiporter rather than a symporter, why it specifically exchanges Na+ and Ca2+, and why the stoichiometry of this exchange is exactly 3:1. We also rationalize why the protein does not exchange H+ for either Ca2+ or Na+, despite being able to bind H+ and its high similarity with H+/Ca2+ exchangers. Interestingly, the nature of this transporter is not explained by its primary structural states, known as inward- and outward-open conformations; instead, the defining factor is the feasibility of conformational intermediates between those states, wherein access pathways leading to the substrate binding sites become simultaneously occluded from both sides of the membrane. This analysis offers a physically coherent, broadly transferable route to understand the emergence of function from structure among secondary-active membrane transporters.
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Affiliation(s)
- Fabrizio Marinelli
- Theoretical Molecular Biophysics Laboratory, National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute, NIH, Bethesda, MD 20814
| | - José D Faraldo-Gómez
- Theoretical Molecular Biophysics Laboratory, National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute, NIH, Bethesda, MD 20814
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8
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Klyshko E, Kim JSH, McGough L, Valeeva V, Lee E, Ranganathan R, Rauscher S. Functional protein dynamics in a crystal. Nat Commun 2024; 15:3244. [PMID: 38622111 PMCID: PMC11018856 DOI: 10.1038/s41467-024-47473-4] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/17/2023] [Accepted: 04/02/2024] [Indexed: 04/17/2024] Open
Abstract
Proteins are molecular machines and to understand how they work, we need to understand how they move. New pump-probe time-resolved X-ray diffraction methods open up ways to initiate and observe protein motions with atomistic detail in crystals on biologically relevant timescales. However, practical limitations of these experiments demands parallel development of effective molecular dynamics approaches to accelerate progress and extract meaning. Here, we establish robust and accurate methods for simulating dynamics in protein crystals, a nontrivial process requiring careful attention to equilibration, environmental composition, and choice of force fields. With more than seven milliseconds of sampling of a single chain, we identify critical factors controlling agreement between simulation and experiments and show that simulated motions recapitulate ligand-induced conformational changes. This work enables a virtuous cycle between simulation and experiments for visualizing and understanding the basic functional motions of proteins.
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Affiliation(s)
- Eugene Klyshko
- Department of Physics, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
- Department of Chemical and Physical Sciences, University of Toronto Mississauga, Mississauga, ON, Canada
| | - Justin Sung-Ho Kim
- Department of Physics, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
- Department of Chemical and Physical Sciences, University of Toronto Mississauga, Mississauga, ON, Canada
| | - Lauren McGough
- Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA
| | - Victoria Valeeva
- Department of Chemical and Physical Sciences, University of Toronto Mississauga, Mississauga, ON, Canada
| | - Ethan Lee
- Department of Chemical and Physical Sciences, University of Toronto Mississauga, Mississauga, ON, Canada
- Department of Chemistry, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
| | - Rama Ranganathan
- Center for Physics of Evolving Systems and Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA
- Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA
| | - Sarah Rauscher
- Department of Physics, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada.
- Department of Chemical and Physical Sciences, University of Toronto Mississauga, Mississauga, ON, Canada.
- Department of Chemistry, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada.
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9
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Masuda T, Suzuki M, Yamasaki M, Mikami B. Subatomic structure of orthorhombic thaumatin at 0.89 Å reveals that highly flexible conformations are crucial for thaumatin sweetness. Biochem Biophys Res Commun 2024; 703:149601. [PMID: 38364680 DOI: 10.1016/j.bbrc.2024.149601] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/25/2024] [Accepted: 01/29/2024] [Indexed: 02/18/2024]
Abstract
Thaumatin is a sweet-tasting protein that elicits a sweet taste at a threshold of approximately 50 nM. Structure-sweetness relationships in thaumatin suggest that the basicity of two amino acids residues, Arg82 and Lys67, are particularly responsible for sweetness. Using tetragonal crystals, our structural analysis suggested that flexible sidechain conformations of these two residues play an important role in sweetness. However, in tetragonal crystals, Arg82 is adjacent to symmetry-related residues, and its flexibility is relatively restrained by the crystal packing. To reduce and diminish these symmetry-related effects, orthorhombic crystals were prepared, and their structures were successfully determined at a resolution of 0.89 Å. Within the orthorhombic lattice, two alternative conformations were more clearly visible at Lys67 than in a tetragonal system. Interestingly, for the first time, three alternative conformations at Arg82 were only found in an orthorhombic system. These results suggest the importance of flexible conformations in sweetness determinants. Such subtle structural variations might serve to adjust the complementarity of the electrostatic potentials of sweet receptors, thereby eliciting the potent sweet taste of thaumatin.
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Affiliation(s)
- Tetsuya Masuda
- Department of Food Sciences and Human Nutrition, Faculty of Agriculture, Ryukoku University, 1-5 Yokotani, Seta Oe-cho, Otsu, Shiga, 520-2194, Japan; Division of Food Science and Biotechnology, Graduate School of Agriculture, Kyoto University, Gokasho, Uji, Kyoto, 611-0011, Japan.
| | - Mamoru Suzuki
- Institute for Protein Research, Osaka University, 3-2 Yamadaoka, Suita, Osaka, 565-0871, Japan
| | - Masayuki Yamasaki
- Department of Food Sciences and Human Nutrition, Faculty of Agriculture, Ryukoku University, 1-5 Yokotani, Seta Oe-cho, Otsu, Shiga, 520-2194, Japan
| | - Bunzo Mikami
- Research Institute for Sustainable Humanosphere, Kyoto University, Gokasho, Uji, Kyoto, 611-0011, Japan; Institute of Advanced Energy, Kyoto University, Gokasho, Uji, Kyoto, 611-0011, Japan
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10
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Mansoor S, Baek M, Park H, Lee GR, Baker D. Protein Ensemble Generation Through Variational Autoencoder Latent Space Sampling. J Chem Theory Comput 2024; 20:2689-2695. [PMID: 38547871 PMCID: PMC11008089 DOI: 10.1021/acs.jctc.3c01057] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/23/2023] [Revised: 02/25/2024] [Accepted: 02/26/2024] [Indexed: 04/10/2024]
Abstract
Mapping the ensemble of protein conformations that contribute to function and can be targeted by small molecule drugs remains an outstanding challenge. Here, we explore the use of variational autoencoders for reducing the challenge of dimensionality in the protein structure ensemble generation problem. We convert high-dimensional protein structural data into a continuous, low-dimensional representation, carry out a search in this space guided by a structure quality metric, and then use RoseTTAFold guided by the sampled structural information to generate 3D structures. We use this approach to generate ensembles for the cancer relevant protein K-Ras, train the VAE on a subset of the available K-Ras crystal structures and MD simulation snapshots, and assess the extent of sampling close to crystal structures withheld from training. We find that our latent space sampling procedure rapidly generates ensembles with high structural quality and is able to sample within 1 Å of held-out crystal structures, with a consistency higher than that of MD simulation or AlphaFold2 prediction. The sampled structures sufficiently recapitulate the cryptic pockets in the held-out K-Ras structures to allow for small molecule docking.
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Affiliation(s)
- Sanaa Mansoor
- Department
of Biochemistry, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington 98195, United States
- Institute
for Protein Design, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington 98195, United States
- Molecular
Engineering Graduate Program, University
of Washington, Seattle, Washington 98195, United States
| | - Minkyung Baek
- Department
of Biochemistry, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington 98195, United States
- Institute
for Protein Design, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington 98195, United States
- School
of Biological Sciences, Seoul National University, Seoul 08826, Republic of Korea
| | - Hahnbeom Park
- Department
of Biochemistry, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington 98195, United States
- Institute
for Protein Design, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington 98195, United States
- Brain
Science Institute, Korea Institute of Science
and Technology, Seoul 02792, Republic of Korea
| | - Gyu Rie Lee
- Department
of Biochemistry, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington 98195, United States
- Institute
for Protein Design, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington 98195, United States
| | - David Baker
- Department
of Biochemistry, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington 98195, United States
- Institute
for Protein Design, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington 98195, United States
- Howard Hughes Medical Institute, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington 98195, United States
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11
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Abstract
Kinases compose one of the largest fractions of the human proteome, and their misfunction is implicated in many diseases, in particular, cancers. The ubiquitousness and structural similarities of kinases make specific and effective drug design difficult. In particular, conformational variability due to the evolutionarily conserved Asp-Phe-Gly (DFG) motif adopting in and out conformations and the relative stabilities thereof are key in structure-based drug design for ATP competitive drugs. These relative conformational stabilities are extremely sensitive to small changes in sequence and provide an important problem for sampling method development. Since the invention of AlphaFold2, the world of structure-based drug design has noticeably changed. In spite of it being limited to crystal-like structure prediction, several methods have also leveraged its underlying architecture to improve dynamics and enhanced sampling of conformational ensembles, including AlphaFold2-RAVE. Here, we extend AlphaFold2-RAVE and apply it to a set of kinases: the wild type DDR1 sequence and three mutants with single point mutations that are known to behave drastically differently. We show that AlphaFold2-RAVE is able to efficiently recover the changes in relative stability using transferable learned order parameters and potentials, thereby supplementing AlphaFold2 as a tool for exploration of Boltzmann-weighted protein conformations (Meller, A.; Bhakat, S.; Solieva, S.; Bowman, G. R. Accelerating Cryptic Pocket Discovery Using AlphaFold. J. Chem. Theory Comput. 2023, 19, 4355-4363).
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Affiliation(s)
- Bodhi P. Vani
- Institute for Physical Science and Technology, University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland 20742, USA
| | - Akashnathan Aranganathan
- Biophysics Program and Institute for Physical Science and Technology, University of Maryland, College Park 20742, USA
| | - Pratyush Tiwary
- Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry and Institute for Physical Science and Technology, University of Maryland, College Park 20742, USA
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12
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Xu S, Onoda A. Accurate and Fast Prediction of Intrinsically Disordered Protein by Multiple Protein Language Models and Ensemble Learning. J Chem Inf Model 2024; 64:2901-2911. [PMID: 37883249 DOI: 10.1021/acs.jcim.3c01202] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 10/28/2023]
Abstract
Intrinsically disordered proteins (IDPs) play a vital role in various biological processes and have attracted increasing attention in the past few decades. Predicting IDPs from the primary structures of proteins offers a rapid and facile means of protein analysis without necessitating crystal structures. In particular, machine learning methods have demonstrated their potential in this field. Recently, protein language models (PLMs) are emerging as a promising approach to extracting essential information from protein sequences and have been employed in protein modeling to utilize their advantages of precision and efficiency. In this article, we developed a novel IDP prediction method named IDP-ELM to predict the intrinsically disordered regions (IDRs) as well as their functions including disordered flexible linkers and disordered protein binding. This method utilizes high-dimensional representations extracted from several state-of-the-art PLMs and predicts IDRs by ensemble learning based on bidirectional recurrent neural networks. The performance of the method was evaluated on two independent test data sets from CAID (critical assessment of protein intrinsic disorder prediction) and CAID2, indicating notable improvements in terms of area under the receiver operating characteristic (AUC), Matthew's correlation coefficient (MCC), and F1 score. Moreover, IDP-ELM requires solely protein sequences as inputs and does not entail a time-consuming process of protein profile generation, which is a prerequisite for most existing state-of-the-art methods, enabling an accurate, fast, and convenient tool for proteome-level analysis. The corresponding reproducible source code and model weights are available at https://github.com/xu-shi-jie/idp-elm.
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Affiliation(s)
- Shijie Xu
- Graduate School of Environmental Science, Hokkaido University, Sapporo 060-0810, Japan
| | - Akira Onoda
- Graduate School of Environmental Science, Hokkaido University, Sapporo 060-0810, Japan
- Faculty of Environmental Earth Science, Hokkaido University, Sapporo 060-0810, Japan
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13
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Sobti M, Ueno H, Brown SHJ, Noji H, Stewart AG. The series of conformational states adopted by rotorless F 1-ATPase during its hydrolysis cycle. Structure 2024; 32:393-399.e3. [PMID: 38237595 DOI: 10.1016/j.str.2023.12.014] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/22/2023] [Revised: 11/02/2023] [Accepted: 12/21/2023] [Indexed: 04/07/2024]
Abstract
F1Fo ATP synthase interchanges phosphate transfer energy and proton motive force via a rotary catalytic mechanism and isolated F1-ATPase subcomplexes can also hydrolyze ATP to generate rotation of their central γ rotor subunit. As ATP is hydrolyzed, the F1-ATPase cycles through a series of conformational states that mediates unidirectional rotation of the rotor. However, even in the absence of a rotor, the α and β subunits are still able to pass through a series of conformations, akin to those that generate rotation. Here, we use cryoelectron microscopy to establish the structures of these rotorless states. These structures indicate that cooperativity in this system is likely mediated by contacts between the β subunit lever domains, irrespective of the presence of the γ rotor subunit. These findings provide insight into how long-range information may be transferred in large biological systems.
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Affiliation(s)
- Meghna Sobti
- Molecular, Structural and Computational Biology Division, The Victor Chang Cardiac Research Institute, Darlinghurst, NSW, Australia; St Vincent's Clinical School, Faculty of Medicine, UNSW Sydney, Kensington, NSW, Australia
| | - Hiroshi Ueno
- Applied Chemistry, Graduate School of Engineering, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo 113-8656, Japan
| | - Simon H J Brown
- Molecular Horizons, University of Wollongong, and Illawarra Health and Medical Research Institute, Wollongong, NSW 2522, Australia; ARC Centre for Cryo-electron Microscopy of Membrane Proteins, Monash Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Monash University, Parkville, VIC 3052, Australia
| | - Hiroyuki Noji
- Applied Chemistry, Graduate School of Engineering, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo 113-8656, Japan.
| | - Alastair G Stewart
- Molecular, Structural and Computational Biology Division, The Victor Chang Cardiac Research Institute, Darlinghurst, NSW, Australia; St Vincent's Clinical School, Faculty of Medicine, UNSW Sydney, Kensington, NSW, Australia.
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14
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Struhl K. Intrinsically disordered regions (IDRs): A vague and confusing concept for protein function. Mol Cell 2024; 84:1186-1187. [PMID: 38579676 DOI: 10.1016/j.molcel.2024.02.023] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/12/2023] [Revised: 02/13/2024] [Accepted: 02/23/2024] [Indexed: 04/07/2024]
Abstract
The term "intrinsically disordered region" (IDR) in proteins has been used in numerous publications. However, most proteins contain IDRs, the term refers to very different types of structures and functions, and many IDRs become structured upon interaction with other biomolecules. Thus, IDR is an unnecessary, vague, and ultimately confusing concept.
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Affiliation(s)
- Kevin Struhl
- Department of Biological Chemistry and Molecular Pharmacology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA 02115, USA.
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15
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Xu Y, Hu X, Wang C, Liu Y, Chen Q, Liu H. De novo design of cavity-containing proteins with a backbone-centered neural network energy function. Structure 2024; 32:424-432.e4. [PMID: 38325370 DOI: 10.1016/j.str.2024.01.006] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/16/2023] [Revised: 10/04/2023] [Accepted: 01/11/2024] [Indexed: 02/09/2024]
Abstract
The design of small-molecule-binding proteins requires protein backbones that contain cavities. Previous design efforts were based on naturally occurring cavity-containing backbone architectures. Here, we designed diverse cavity-containing backbones without predefined architectures by introducing tailored restraints into the backbone sampling driven by SCUBA (Side Chain-Unknown Backbone Arrangement), a neural network statistical energy function. For 521 out of 5816 designs, the root-mean-square deviations (RMSDs) of the Cα atoms for the AlphaFold2-predicted structures and our designed structures are within 2.0 Å. We experimentally tested 10 designed proteins and determined the crystal structures of two of them. One closely agrees with the designed model, while the other forms a domain-swapped dimer, where the partial structures are in agreement with the designed structures. Our results indicate that data-driven methods such as SCUBA hold great potential for designing de novo proteins with tailored small-molecule-binding function.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yang Xu
- Department of Rheumatology and Immunology, The First Affiliated Hospital of USTC, Centre for Advanced Interdisciplinary Science and Biomedicine of IHM, Hefei National Center for Interdisciplinary Sciences at the Microscale, Division of Life Sciences and Medicine, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, Anhui 230001, China; MOE Key Laboratory for Membraneless Organelles and Cellular Dynamics, Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, School of Life Sciences, Division of Life Sciences and Medicine, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, Anhui 230027, China
| | - Xiuhong Hu
- Department of Rheumatology and Immunology, The First Affiliated Hospital of USTC, Centre for Advanced Interdisciplinary Science and Biomedicine of IHM, Hefei National Center for Interdisciplinary Sciences at the Microscale, Division of Life Sciences and Medicine, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, Anhui 230001, China; MOE Key Laboratory for Membraneless Organelles and Cellular Dynamics, Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, School of Life Sciences, Division of Life Sciences and Medicine, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, Anhui 230027, China
| | - Chenchen Wang
- MOE Key Laboratory for Membraneless Organelles and Cellular Dynamics, Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, School of Life Sciences, Division of Life Sciences and Medicine, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, Anhui 230027, China
| | - Yongrui Liu
- MOE Key Laboratory for Membraneless Organelles and Cellular Dynamics, Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, School of Life Sciences, Division of Life Sciences and Medicine, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, Anhui 230027, China
| | - Quan Chen
- Department of Rheumatology and Immunology, The First Affiliated Hospital of USTC, Centre for Advanced Interdisciplinary Science and Biomedicine of IHM, Hefei National Center for Interdisciplinary Sciences at the Microscale, Division of Life Sciences and Medicine, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, Anhui 230001, China; MOE Key Laboratory for Membraneless Organelles and Cellular Dynamics, Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, School of Life Sciences, Division of Life Sciences and Medicine, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, Anhui 230027, China; Biomedical Sciences and Health Laboratory of Anhui Province, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, Anhui 230027, China.
| | - Haiyan Liu
- MOE Key Laboratory for Membraneless Organelles and Cellular Dynamics, Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, School of Life Sciences, Division of Life Sciences and Medicine, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, Anhui 230027, China; Biomedical Sciences and Health Laboratory of Anhui Province, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, Anhui 230027, China; School of Data Science, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, Anhui 230027, China.
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16
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Plosky B. Terms and conditions. Mol Cell 2024; 84:1173-1174. [PMID: 38579671 DOI: 10.1016/j.molcel.2024.02.036] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/28/2024] [Revised: 02/28/2024] [Accepted: 02/28/2024] [Indexed: 04/07/2024]
Abstract
Brian Plosky provides some context for a debate over the use of "intrinsically disordered" to describe regions of proteins.
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17
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Lemke EA, Babu MM, Kriwacki RW, Mittag T, Pappu RV, Wright PE, Forman-Kay JD. Intrinsic disorder: A term to define the specific physicochemical characteristic of protein conformational heterogeneity. Mol Cell 2024; 84:1188-1190. [PMID: 38579677 DOI: 10.1016/j.molcel.2024.02.024] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/19/2024] [Revised: 02/19/2024] [Accepted: 02/23/2024] [Indexed: 04/07/2024]
Abstract
In his commentary in this issue of Molecular Cell,1 Struhl reasons that the term "intrinsically disordered regions" represents a vague and confusing concept for protein function. However, the term "intrinsically disordered" highlights the important physicochemical characteristic of conformational heterogeneity. Thus, "intrinsically disordered" is the counterpart to the term "folded, " with neither term having specific functional implications.
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Affiliation(s)
- Edward A Lemke
- Biocenter, Johannes Gutenberg University, Hanns-Dieter-Hüsch Weg 17, 55128 Mainz, Germany; Institute for Molecular Biology, Ackermannweg 4, 55128 Mainz, Germany.
| | - M Madan Babu
- Department of Structural Biology, St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, Memphis, TN, USA; Center of Excellence for Data Driven Discovery, Department of Structural Biology, St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, Memphis, TN, USA.
| | - Richard W Kriwacki
- Department of Structural Biology, St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, Memphis, TN, USA; Department of Microbiology, Immunology and Biochemistry, University of Tennessee Health Sciences Center, Memphis, TN, USA.
| | - Tanja Mittag
- Department of Structural Biology, St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, Memphis, TN, USA.
| | - Rohit V Pappu
- Department of Biomedical Engineering and Center for Biomolecular Condensates, Washington University in St. Louis, St. Louis, MO 63130, USA.
| | - Peter E Wright
- Department of Integrative Structural and Computational Biology and Skaggs Institute of Chemical Biology, The Scripps Research Institute, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA.
| | - Julie D Forman-Kay
- Molecular Medicine Program, Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto ON M5G 0A4, Canada; Department of Biochemistry, University of Toronto, Toronto ON M5S 1A8, Canada.
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18
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Hassan BA, Milicaj J, Tyson M, Karki R, Sham YY, Frantom PA, Taylor EA. In Vitro and In Silico Explorations of the Protein Conformational Changes of Corynebacterium glutamicum MshA, a Model Retaining GT-B Glycosyltransferase. Biochemistry 2024; 63:939-951. [PMID: 38507812 DOI: 10.1021/acs.biochem.3c00561] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 03/22/2024]
Abstract
MshA is a GT-B glycosyltransferase catalyzing the first step in the biosynthesis of mycothiol. While many GT-B enzymes undergo an open-to-closed transition, MshA is unique because its 97° rotation is beyond the usual range of 10-25°. Molecular dynamics (MD) simulations were carried out for MshA in both ligand bound and unbound states to investigate the effect of ligand binding on localized protein dynamics and its conformational free energy landscape. Simulations showed that both the unliganded "opened" and liganded "closed" forms of the enzyme sample a wide degree of dihedral angles and interdomain distances with relatively low overlapping populations. Calculation of the free energy surface using replica exchange MD for the apo "opened" and an artificial generated apo "closed" structure revealed overlaps in the geometries sampled, allowing calculation of a barrier of 2 kcal/mol for the open-to-closed transition in the absence of ligands. MD simulations of fully liganded MshA revealed a smaller sampling of the dihedral angles. The localized protein fluctuation changes suggest that UDP-GlcNAc binding activates the motions of loops in the 1-l-myo-inositol-1-phosphate (I1P)-binding site despite little change in the interactions with UDP-GlcNAc. Circular dichroism, intrinsic fluorescence spectroscopy, and mutagenesis studies were used to confirm the ligand-induced structural changes in MshA. The results support a proposed mechanism where UDP-GlcNAc binds with rigid interactions to the C-terminal domain of MshA and activates flexible loops in the N-terminal domain for binding and positioning of I1P. This model can be used for future structure-based drug development of inhibitors of the mycothiol biosynthetic pathway.
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Affiliation(s)
- Bakar A Hassan
- Department of Chemistry, Wesleyan University, Middletown, Connecticut 06459, United States
| | - Jozafina Milicaj
- Department of Chemistry, Wesleyan University, Middletown, Connecticut 06459, United States
| | - Meka Tyson
- Department of Chemistry, Wesleyan University, Middletown, Connecticut 06459, United States
| | - Ramesh Karki
- Department of Chemistry & Biochemistry, The University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, Alabama 35487, United States
| | - Yuk Y Sham
- Bioinformatics and Computational Biology Program, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota 55455, United States
- Department of Integrative Biology and Physiology, Medical School, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota 55455, United States
| | - Patrick A Frantom
- Department of Chemistry & Biochemistry, The University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, Alabama 35487, United States
| | - Erika A Taylor
- Department of Chemistry, Wesleyan University, Middletown, Connecticut 06459, United States
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19
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Stenström O, Diehl C, Modig K, Akke M. Ligand-induced protein transition state stabilization switches the binding pathway from conformational selection to induced fit. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 2024; 121:e2317747121. [PMID: 38527204 PMCID: PMC10998626 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2317747121] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/22/2023] [Accepted: 02/29/2024] [Indexed: 03/27/2024] Open
Abstract
Protein-ligand complex formation is fundamental to biological function. A central question is whether proteins spontaneously adopt binding-competent conformations to which ligands bind conformational selection (CS) or whether ligands induce the binding-competent conformation induced fit (IF). Here, we resolve the CS and IF binding pathways by characterizing protein conformational dynamics over a wide range of ligand concentrations using NMR relaxation dispersion. We determined the relative flux through the two pathways using a four-state binding model that includes both CS and IF. Experiments conducted without ligand show that galectin-3 exchanges between the ground-state conformation and a high-energy conformation similar to the ligand-bound conformation, demonstrating that CS is a plausible pathway. Near-identical crystal structures of the apo and ligand-bound states suggest that the high-energy conformation in solution corresponds to the apo crystal structure. Stepwise additions of the ligand lactose induce progressive changes in the relaxation dispersions that we fit collectively to the four-state model, yielding all microscopic rate constants and binding affinities. The ligand affinity is higher for the bound-like conformation than for the ground state, as expected for CS. Nonetheless, the IF pathway contributes greater than 70% of the total flux even at low ligand concentrations. The higher flux through the IF pathway is explained by considerably higher rates of exchange between the two protein conformations in the ligand-associated state. Thus, the ligand acts to decrease the activation barrier between protein conformations in a manner reciprocal to enzymatic transition-state stabilization of reactions involving ligand transformation.
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Affiliation(s)
- Olof Stenström
- Division of Biophysical Chemistry, Center for Molecular Protein Science, Department of Chemistry, Lund University, SE-221 00Lund, Sweden
| | - Carl Diehl
- Division of Biophysical Chemistry, Center for Molecular Protein Science, Department of Chemistry, Lund University, SE-221 00Lund, Sweden
| | - Kristofer Modig
- Division of Biophysical Chemistry, Center for Molecular Protein Science, Department of Chemistry, Lund University, SE-221 00Lund, Sweden
| | - Mikael Akke
- Division of Biophysical Chemistry, Center for Molecular Protein Science, Department of Chemistry, Lund University, SE-221 00Lund, Sweden
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20
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Wang Q, DiForte C, Aleshintsev A, Elci G, Bhattacharya S, Bongiorno A, Gupta R. Calcium mediated static and dynamic allostery in S100A12: Implications for target recognition by S100 proteins. Protein Sci 2024; 33:e4955. [PMID: 38501487 PMCID: PMC10949321 DOI: 10.1002/pro.4955] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/29/2023] [Revised: 02/09/2024] [Accepted: 02/21/2024] [Indexed: 03/20/2024]
Abstract
Structure and functions of S100 proteins are regulated by two distinct calcium binding EF hand motifs. In this work, we used solution-state NMR spectroscopy to investigate the cooperativity between the two calcium binding sites and map the allosteric changes at the target binding site. To parse the contribution of the individual calcium binding events, variants of S100A12 were designed to selectively bind calcium to either the EF-I (N63A) or EF-II (E31A) loop, respectively. Detailed analysis of the backbone chemical shifts for wildtype protein and its mutants indicates that calcium binding to the canonical EF-II loop is the principal trigger for the conformational switch between 'closed' apo to the 'open' Ca2+ -bound conformation of the protein. Elimination of binding in S100-specific EF-I loop has limited impact on the calcium binding affinity of the EF-II loop and the concomitant structural rearrangement. In contrast, deletion of binding in the EF-II loop significantly attenuates calcium affinity in the EF-I loop and the structure adopts a 'closed' apo-like conformation. Analysis of experimental amide nitrogen (15 N) relaxation rates (R1 , R2 , and 15 N-{1 H} NOE) and molecular dynamics (MD) simulations demonstrate that the calcium bound state is relatively floppy with pico-nanosecond motions induced in functionally relevant domains responsible for target recognition such as the hinge domain and the C-terminal residues. Experimental relaxation studies combined with MD simulations show that while calcium binding in the EF-I loop alone does not induce significant motions in the polypeptide chain, EF-I regulates fluctuations in the polypeptide in the presence of bound calcium in the EF-II loop. These results offer novel insights into the dynamic regulation of target recognition by calcium binding and unravels the role of cooperativity between the two calcium binding events in S100A12.
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Affiliation(s)
- Qian Wang
- Department of ChemistryCollege of Staten Island, City University of New YorkNew YorkUnited States
| | - Christopher DiForte
- Department of ChemistryCollege of Staten Island, City University of New YorkNew YorkUnited States
- Ph.D. Programs in Biochemistry and ChemistryThe Graduate Center of the City University of New YorkUnited States
| | - Aleksey Aleshintsev
- Department of ChemistryCollege of Staten Island, City University of New YorkNew YorkUnited States
- Ph.D. Programs in Biochemistry and ChemistryThe Graduate Center of the City University of New YorkUnited States
| | - Gianna Elci
- Department of ChemistryCollege of Staten Island, City University of New YorkNew YorkUnited States
| | | | - Angelo Bongiorno
- Department of ChemistryCollege of Staten Island, City University of New YorkNew YorkUnited States
- Ph.D. Programs in Biochemistry and ChemistryThe Graduate Center of the City University of New YorkUnited States
| | - Rupal Gupta
- Department of ChemistryCollege of Staten Island, City University of New YorkNew YorkUnited States
- Ph.D. Programs in Biochemistry and ChemistryThe Graduate Center of the City University of New YorkUnited States
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21
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Yu Q, Wang Z, Tu Y, Cao Y, Zhu H, Shao J, Zhuang R, Zhou Y, Zhang J. Proteasome activation: A novel strategy for targeting undruggable intrinsically disordered proteins. Bioorg Chem 2024; 145:107217. [PMID: 38368657 DOI: 10.1016/j.bioorg.2024.107217] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/03/2023] [Revised: 01/23/2024] [Accepted: 02/14/2024] [Indexed: 02/20/2024]
Abstract
Intrinsically disordered proteins (IDPs) are characterized by their inability to adopt well-defined tertiary structures under physiological conditions. Nonetheless, they often play pivotal roles in the progression of various diseases, including cancer, neurodegenerative disorders, and cardiovascular ailments. Owing to their inherent dynamism, conventional drug design approaches based on structural considerations encounter substantial challenges when applied to IDPs. Consequently, the pursuit of therapeutic interventions directed towards IDPs presents a complex endeavor. While there are indeed existing methodologies for targeting IDPs, they are encumbered by noteworthy constrains. Hence, there exists an imminent imperative to investigate more efficacious and universally applicable strategies for modulating IDPs. Here, we present an overview of the latest advancements in the research pertaining to IDPs, along with the indirect regulation approach involving the modulation of IDP degradation through proteasome. By comprehending these advancements in research, novel insights can be generated to facilitate the development of new drugs targeted at addressing the accumulation of IDPs in diverse pathological conditions.
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Affiliation(s)
- Qian Yu
- Key Laboratory of Novel Targets and Drug Study for Neural Repair of Zhejiang Province, School of Medicine, Hangzhou City University, Hangzhou, 310015, Zhejiang Province, China; College of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, 310058, Zhejiang Province, China
| | - Zheng Wang
- Key Laboratory of Novel Targets and Drug Study for Neural Repair of Zhejiang Province, School of Medicine, Hangzhou City University, Hangzhou, 310015, Zhejiang Province, China; College of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, 310058, Zhejiang Province, China
| | - Yutong Tu
- The National Center for Drug Screening, Shanghai Institute of Materia Medica, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai, 201203, China
| | - Yu Cao
- Department of Pharmaceutical Preparation, Hangzhou Xixi Hospital, Hangzhou, 310023, Zhejiang Province, China
| | - Huajian Zhu
- Key Laboratory of Novel Targets and Drug Study for Neural Repair of Zhejiang Province, School of Medicine, Hangzhou City University, Hangzhou, 310015, Zhejiang Province, China; College of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, 310058, Zhejiang Province, China
| | - Jiaan Shao
- Key Laboratory of Novel Targets and Drug Study for Neural Repair of Zhejiang Province, School of Medicine, Hangzhou City University, Hangzhou, 310015, Zhejiang Province, China; College of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, 310058, Zhejiang Province, China
| | - Rangxiao Zhuang
- Department of Pharmaceutical Preparation, Hangzhou Xixi Hospital, Hangzhou, 310023, Zhejiang Province, China.
| | - Yubo Zhou
- The National Center for Drug Screening, Shanghai Institute of Materia Medica, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai, 201203, China.
| | - Jiankang Zhang
- Key Laboratory of Novel Targets and Drug Study for Neural Repair of Zhejiang Province, School of Medicine, Hangzhou City University, Hangzhou, 310015, Zhejiang Province, China; College of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, 310058, Zhejiang Province, China.
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22
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Reveguk I, Simonson T. Classifying protein kinase conformations with machine learning. Protein Sci 2024; 33:e4918. [PMID: 38501429 PMCID: PMC10962494 DOI: 10.1002/pro.4918] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/26/2023] [Revised: 01/02/2024] [Accepted: 01/22/2024] [Indexed: 03/20/2024]
Abstract
Protein kinases are key actors of signaling networks and important drug targets. They cycle between active and inactive conformations, distinguished by a few elements within the catalytic domain. One is the activation loop, whose conserved DFG motif can occupy DFG-in, DFG-out, and some rarer conformations. Annotation and classification of the structural kinome are important, as different conformations can be targeted by different inhibitors and activators. Valuable resources exist; however, large-scale applications will benefit from increased automation and interpretability of structural annotation. Interpretable machine learning models are described for this purpose, based on ensembles of decision trees. To train them, a set of catalytic domain sequences and structures was collected, somewhat larger and more diverse than existing resources. The structures were clustered based on the DFG conformation and manually annotated. They were then used as training input. Two main models were constructed, which distinguished active/inactive and in/out/other DFG conformations. They considered initially 1692 structural variables, spanning the whole catalytic domain, then identified ("learned") a small subset that sufficed for accurate classification. The first model correctly labeled all but 3 of 3289 structures as active or inactive, while the second assigned the correct DFG label to all but 17 of 8826 structures. The most potent classifying variables were all related to well-known structural elements in or near the activation loop and their ranking gives insights into the conformational preferences. The models were used to automatically annotate 3850 kinase structures predicted recently with the Alphafold2 tool, showing that Alphafold2 reproduced the active/inactive but not the DFG-in proportions seen in the Protein Data Bank. We expect the models will be useful for understanding and engineering kinases.
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Affiliation(s)
- Ivan Reveguk
- Laboratoire de Biologie Structurale de la Cellule (CNRS UMR7654)Ecole PolytechniquePalaiseauFrance
| | - Thomas Simonson
- Laboratoire de Biologie Structurale de la Cellule (CNRS UMR7654)Ecole PolytechniquePalaiseauFrance
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23
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Bermejo GA, Tjandra N, Clore GM, Schwieters CD. Xplor-NIH: Better parameters and protocols for NMR protein structure determination. Protein Sci 2024; 33:e4922. [PMID: 38501482 PMCID: PMC10962493 DOI: 10.1002/pro.4922] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/28/2023] [Revised: 01/26/2024] [Accepted: 01/28/2024] [Indexed: 03/20/2024]
Abstract
The present work describes an update to the protein covalent geometry and atomic radii parameters in the Xplor-NIH biomolecular structure determination package. In combination with an improved treatment of selected non-bonded interactions between atoms three bonds apart, such as those involving methyl hydrogens, and a previously developed term that affects the system's gyration volume, the new parameters are tested using structure calculations on 30 proteins with restraints derived from nuclear magnetic resonance data. Using modern structure validation criteria, including several formally adopted by the Protein Data Bank, and a clear measure of structural accuracy, the results show superior performance relative to previous Xplor-NIH implementations. Additionally, the Xplor-NIH structures compare favorably against originally determined NMR models.
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Affiliation(s)
- Guillermo A. Bermejo
- Laboratory of Chemical PhysicsNational Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, National Institutes of HealthBethesdaMarylandUSA
| | - Nico Tjandra
- Biochemistry and Biophysics Center, National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, National Institutes of HealthBethesdaMarylandUSA
| | - G. Marius Clore
- Laboratory of Chemical PhysicsNational Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, National Institutes of HealthBethesdaMarylandUSA
| | - Charles D. Schwieters
- Laboratory of Chemical PhysicsNational Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, National Institutes of HealthBethesdaMarylandUSA
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24
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Radić Z. Connectivity between surface and interior in catalytic subunits of acetylcholinesterases inferred from their X-ray structures. J Neurochem 2024; 168:386-396. [PMID: 36892323 PMCID: PMC10491739 DOI: 10.1111/jnc.15802] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/23/2023] [Revised: 02/23/2023] [Accepted: 02/28/2023] [Indexed: 03/10/2023]
Abstract
Catalytic activity and function of acetylcholinesterase (AChE; EC 3.1.1.7) have been recognized and studied for over a century and its quaternary and primary structures for about half a century, and its tertiary structure has been known for about 33 years. Clear understanding of relationships between the structure and the function is still pending for this enzyme. Hundreds of crystallographic, static snapshots of AChEs from different sources reveal largely one general backbone conformation with narrow entry into the active center gorge, tightly fit to accept one acetylcholine (ACh) molecule, in contrast to its high catalytic turnover. This short review of available X-ray structures of AChEs from electric ray Torpedo californica, mouse and human, finds some limited, yet consistent deviations in conformations of selected secondary structure elements of AChE relevant for its function. The observed conformational diversity of the acyl pocket loop of AChE, unlike the large Ω-loop, appears consistent with structurally dynamic INS data and solution-based SAXS experiments to explain its dominant role in controlling the size of the active center gorge opening, as well as connectivity between the immediate surroundings of the buried active Ser, and catalytically relevant sites on the AChE surface.
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Affiliation(s)
- Zoran Radić
- Skaggs School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of California at San Diego, La Jolla, California, USA
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25
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Miller JE, Agdanowski MP, Dolinsky JL, Sawaya MR, Cascio D, Rodriguez JA, Yeates TO. AlphaFold-assisted structure determination of a bacterial protein of unknown function using X-ray and electron crystallography. Acta Crystallogr D Struct Biol 2024; 80:270-278. [PMID: 38451205 PMCID: PMC10994174 DOI: 10.1107/s205979832400072x] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/06/2023] [Accepted: 01/19/2024] [Indexed: 03/08/2024] Open
Abstract
Macromolecular crystallography generally requires the recovery of missing phase information from diffraction data to reconstruct an electron-density map of the crystallized molecule. Most recent structures have been solved using molecular replacement as a phasing method, requiring an a priori structure that is closely related to the target protein to serve as a search model; when no such search model exists, molecular replacement is not possible. New advances in computational machine-learning methods, however, have resulted in major advances in protein structure predictions from sequence information. Methods that generate predicted structural models of sufficient accuracy provide a powerful approach to molecular replacement. Taking advantage of these advances, AlphaFold predictions were applied to enable structure determination of a bacterial protein of unknown function (UniProtKB Q63NT7, NCBI locus BPSS0212) based on diffraction data that had evaded phasing attempts using MIR and anomalous scattering methods. Using both X-ray and micro-electron (microED) diffraction data, it was possible to solve the structure of the main fragment of the protein using a predicted model of that domain as a starting point. The use of predicted structural models importantly expands the promise of electron diffraction, where structure determination relies critically on molecular replacement.
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Affiliation(s)
- Justin E. Miller
- Molecular Biology Institute, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA
| | - Matthew P. Agdanowski
- Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA
| | - Joshua L. Dolinsky
- Molecular Biology Institute, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA
| | - Michael R. Sawaya
- Institute for Genomics and Proteomics, UCLA–DOE, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA
| | - Duilio Cascio
- Institute for Genomics and Proteomics, UCLA–DOE, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA
| | - Jose A. Rodriguez
- Molecular Biology Institute, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA
- Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA
- Institute for Genomics and Proteomics, UCLA–DOE, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA
| | - Todd O. Yeates
- Molecular Biology Institute, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA
- Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA
- Institute for Genomics and Proteomics, UCLA–DOE, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA
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26
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Coram AE, Morewood R, Voss S, Price JL, Nitsche C. Exploring biocompatible chemistry to create stapled and photoswitchable variants of the antimicrobial peptide aurein 1.2. J Pept Sci 2024; 30:e3551. [PMID: 37926859 DOI: 10.1002/psc.3551] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/19/2023] [Revised: 09/29/2023] [Accepted: 09/29/2023] [Indexed: 11/07/2023]
Abstract
Antibiotic resistance is an escalating global health threat. Due to their diverse mechanisms of action and evasion of traditional resistance mechanisms, peptides hold promise as future antibiotics. Their ability to disrupt bacterial membranes presents a potential strategy to combat drug-resistant infections and address the increasing need for effective antimicrobial treatments. Amphipathic α-helical peptides possess a distinctive molecular structure with both charged/hydrophilic and hydrophobic regions that interact with the bacterial cell membrane, disrupting its structural integrity. The α-helical amphipathic peptide aurein 1.2, secreted by the Australian frog Litoria aurea, is one of the shortest known antimicrobial peptides, spanning only 13 amino acids. The primary objective of this study was to investigate stapled and photoswitchable modifications of short helical peptides employing biocompatible chemistry, utilising aurein 1.2 as a model system. We developed various stapled versions of aurein 1.2 using biocompatible conjugation chemistry between dicyanopyridine and 1,2-aminothiols. While the commonly employed stapling pattern for longer staples is i, i + 7, we observed superior helicity in peptides stapled at positions i, i + 8. Molecular dynamics simulations confirmed both stapling patterns to support an α-helical peptide conformation. Additionally, we utilised a cysteine-selective photosensitive staple, perfluoro azobenzene, to explore photoswitchable variants of aurein 1.2. A double-cysteine variant stapled at i, i + 7 indeed exhibited a change in overall helicity induced by light. We further demonstrated the applicability of this staple to attach to cysteine residues in i, i + 7 positions of a helix in a model protein. While some of the stapled variants displayed substantial increase in helicity, minimal inhibitory concentration assays revealed that none of the stapled aurein 1.2 variants exhibited increased antimicrobial activity compared to the wildtype.
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Affiliation(s)
- Alexandra E Coram
- Research School of Chemistry, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
| | - Richard Morewood
- Research School of Chemistry, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
| | - Saan Voss
- Research School of Chemistry, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
| | - Joshua L Price
- Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Brigham Young University, Provo, UT, USA
| | - Christoph Nitsche
- Research School of Chemistry, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
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27
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Jamali K, Käll L, Zhang R, Brown A, Kimanius D, Scheres SHW. Automated model building and protein identification in cryo-EM maps. Nature 2024; 628:450-457. [PMID: 38408488 PMCID: PMC11006616 DOI: 10.1038/s41586-024-07215-4] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/17/2023] [Accepted: 02/19/2024] [Indexed: 02/28/2024]
Abstract
Interpreting electron cryo-microscopy (cryo-EM) maps with atomic models requires high levels of expertise and labour-intensive manual intervention in three-dimensional computer graphics programs1,2. Here we present ModelAngelo, a machine-learning approach for automated atomic model building in cryo-EM maps. By combining information from the cryo-EM map with information from protein sequence and structure in a single graph neural network, ModelAngelo builds atomic models for proteins that are of similar quality to those generated by human experts. For nucleotides, ModelAngelo builds backbones with similar accuracy to those built by humans. By using its predicted amino acid probabilities for each residue in hidden Markov model sequence searches, ModelAngelo outperforms human experts in the identification of proteins with unknown sequences. ModelAngelo will therefore remove bottlenecks and increase objectivity in cryo-EM structure determination.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Lukas Käll
- Science for Life Laboratory, KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Rui Zhang
- Washington University in St Louis, St Louis, MO, USA
| | - Alan Brown
- Blavatnik Institute, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
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28
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Doğru EK, Sakallı T, Liu G, Sayers Z, Surmeli NB. Small angle X-ray scattering analysis of thermophilic cytochrome P450 CYP119 and the effects of the N-terminal histidine tag. Int J Biol Macromol 2024; 265:131026. [PMID: 38522710 DOI: 10.1016/j.ijbiomac.2024.131026] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/11/2024] [Revised: 03/15/2024] [Accepted: 03/18/2024] [Indexed: 03/26/2024]
Abstract
Combining size exclusion chromatography-small angle X-ray scattering (SEC-SAXS) and molecular dynamics (MD) analysis is a promising approach to investigate protein behavior in solution, particularly for understanding conformational changes due to substrate binding in cytochrome P450s (CYPs). This study investigates conformational changes in CYP119, a thermophilic CYP from Sulfolobus acidocaldarius that exhibits structural flexibility similar to mammalian CYPs. Although the crystal structure of ligand-free (open state) and ligand-bound (closed state) forms of CYP119 is known, the overall structure of the enzyme in solution has not been explored until now. It was found that theoretical scattering profiles from the crystal structures of CYP119 did not align with the SAXS data, but conformers from MD simulations, particularly starting from the open state (46 % of all frames), agreed well. Interestingly, a small percentage of closed-state conformers also fit the data (9 %), suggesting ligand-free CYP119 samples ligand-bound conformations. Ab initio SAXS models for N-His tagged CYP119 revealed a tail-like unfolded structure impacting protein flexibility, which was confirmed by in silico modeling. SEC-SAXS analysis of N-His CYP119 indicated pentameric structures in addition to monomers in solution, affecting the stability and activity of the enzyme. This study adds insights into the conformational dynamics of CYP119 in solution.
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Affiliation(s)
- Ekin Kestevur Doğru
- İzmir Institute of Technology, Faculty of Engineering, Department of Bioengineering, 35430 Urla, Izmir, Türkiye
| | - Tuğçe Sakallı
- İzmir Institute of Technology, Faculty of Engineering, Department of Bioengineering, 35430 Urla, Izmir, Türkiye
| | - Goksin Liu
- Sabancı University, Faculty of Engineering and Natural Sciences, Orhanli, Tuzla 34956, Istanbul, Türkiye
| | - Zehra Sayers
- Sabancı University, Faculty of Engineering and Natural Sciences, Orhanli, Tuzla 34956, Istanbul, Türkiye
| | - Nur Basak Surmeli
- İzmir Institute of Technology, Faculty of Engineering, Department of Bioengineering, 35430 Urla, Izmir, Türkiye.
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29
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Tian F, Gu X, Li Y, Cai L. Evaluating the effects of graphene nanoparticles combined radio-frequency thawing on the physicochemical quality and protein conformation in hairtail (Trichiurus lepturus) dorsal muscle. J Sci Food Agric 2024; 104:2809-2819. [PMID: 38009613 DOI: 10.1002/jsfa.13169] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/06/2023] [Revised: 11/19/2023] [Accepted: 11/23/2023] [Indexed: 11/29/2023]
Abstract
BACKGROUND The thawing process is an essential step for a frozen marine fish. The present study aimed to investigate the effects of graphene magnetic nanoparticles combined radio-frequency thawing methods on frozen hairtail (Trichiurus lepturus) dorsal muscle. Seven thawing methods were used: air thawing, 4 °C cold storage thawing, water thawing, radio-frequency thawing (RT), radio frequency thawing combined with graphene nanoparticles (G-RT), radio frequency thawing combined with graphene oxide nanoparticles (GO-RT) and radio-frequency thawing combined with graphene magnetic nanoparticles (GM-RT). The thawing loss and centrifugal loss, electric conductivity, total volatile basic nitrogen, thiobarbituric acid reactive substances and color of thawed hairtail dorsal muscle were determined. The carbonyl content, total sulfhydryl groups, Ca2+ -ATPase activity, raman spectroscopy measurements and Fourier-transform infrared spectrometry measurements were determined using myofibrillar extracted from the dorsal muscle of hairtail. The water distribution was determined using low-field NMR techniques. RESULTS The results demonstrated that the RT, G-RT, GO-RT and GM-RT could significantly shorten the thawing time. Moreover, GO-RT and GM-RT efficiently preserved the color of fish dorsal muscle and reduced the impact of thawing on fish quality by reducing lipid and protein oxidation. Meanwhile, the myofibrillar protein structure thawed by GO-RT and GM-RT were more stable and had a more stable secondary structure, which maintained strong systemic stability at the same time as slowing down protein oxidation. CONCLUSION The results showed that GO-RT and GM-RT can significantly improve the thawing efficiency at the same time as effectively maintaining and improving the color and texture of thawed fish, slowing down the oxidation of proteins and lipids, and maintaining a good quality of thawed fish meat. © 2023 Society of Chemical Industry.
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Affiliation(s)
- Fang Tian
- Key Laboratory of Health Risk Factors for Seafood of Zhejiang Province, College of Food Science and Pharmaceutics, Zhejiang Ocean University, Zhoushan, China
| | - Xiaohan Gu
- Key Laboratory of Health Risk Factors for Seafood of Zhejiang Province, College of Food Science and Pharmaceutics, Zhejiang Ocean University, Zhoushan, China
- Ningbo Innovation Center, College of Biosystems Engineering and Food Science, Zhejiang University, Ningbo, China
| | - Yujin Li
- College of Food Science and Engineering, Ocean University of China, Qingdao, China
| | - Luyun Cai
- Ningbo Innovation Center, College of Biosystems Engineering and Food Science, Zhejiang University, Ningbo, China
- College of Biological and Chemical Engineering, Zhejiang Engineering Research Center for Intelligent Marine Ranch Equipment, NingboTech University, Ningbo, China
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30
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Smith N, Dasgupta M, Wych DC, Dolamore C, Sierra RG, Lisova S, Marchany-Rivera D, Cohen AE, Boutet S, Hunter MS, Kupitz C, Poitevin F, Moss FR, Mittan-Moreau DW, Brewster AS, Sauter NK, Young ID, Wolff AM, Tiwari VK, Kumar N, Berkowitz DB, Hadt RG, Thompson MC, Follmer AH, Wall ME, Wilson MA. Changes in an enzyme ensemble during catalysis observed by high-resolution XFEL crystallography. Sci Adv 2024; 10:eadk7201. [PMID: 38536910 PMCID: PMC10971408 DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.adk7201] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/06/2023] [Accepted: 02/21/2024] [Indexed: 04/01/2024]
Abstract
Enzymes populate ensembles of structures necessary for catalysis that are difficult to experimentally characterize. We use time-resolved mix-and-inject serial crystallography at an x-ray free electron laser to observe catalysis in a designed mutant isocyanide hydratase (ICH) enzyme that enhances sampling of important minor conformations. The active site exists in a mixture of conformations, and formation of the thioimidate intermediate selects for catalytically competent substates. The influence of cysteine ionization on the ICH ensemble is validated by determining structures of the enzyme at multiple pH values. Large molecular dynamics simulations in crystallo and time-resolved electron density maps show that Asp17 ionizes during catalysis and causes conformational changes that propagate across the dimer, permitting water to enter the active site for intermediate hydrolysis. ICH exhibits a tight coupling between ionization of active site residues and catalysis-activated protein motions, exemplifying a mechanism of electrostatic control of enzyme dynamics.
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Affiliation(s)
- Nathan Smith
- Department of Biochemistry and Redox Biology Center, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, NE 68588, USA
| | - Medhanjali Dasgupta
- Department of Biochemistry and Redox Biology Center, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, NE 68588, USA
| | - David C. Wych
- Computer, Computational, and Statistical Sciences Division, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, NM 875405, USA
- Center for Nonlinear Studies, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, NM 87545, USA
| | - Cole Dolamore
- Department of Biochemistry and Redox Biology Center, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, NE 68588, USA
| | - Raymond G. Sierra
- Linac Coherent Light Source, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Stanford University, Menlo Park, CA 94025, USA
| | - Stella Lisova
- Linac Coherent Light Source, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Stanford University, Menlo Park, CA 94025, USA
| | - Darya Marchany-Rivera
- Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Stanford University, Menlo Park, CA 94025, USA
| | - Aina E. Cohen
- Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Stanford University, Menlo Park, CA 94025, USA
| | - Sébastien Boutet
- Linac Coherent Light Source, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Stanford University, Menlo Park, CA 94025, USA
| | - Mark S. Hunter
- Linac Coherent Light Source, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Stanford University, Menlo Park, CA 94025, USA
| | - Christopher Kupitz
- Linac Coherent Light Source, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Stanford University, Menlo Park, CA 94025, USA
| | - Frédéric Poitevin
- Linac Coherent Light Source, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Stanford University, Menlo Park, CA 94025, USA
| | - Frank R. Moss
- Linac Coherent Light Source, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Stanford University, Menlo Park, CA 94025, USA
| | - David W. Mittan-Moreau
- Molecular Biophysics and Integrated Bioimaging Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA
| | - Aaron S. Brewster
- Molecular Biophysics and Integrated Bioimaging Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA
| | - Nicholas K. Sauter
- Molecular Biophysics and Integrated Bioimaging Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA
| | - Iris D. Young
- Molecular Biophysics and Integrated Bioimaging Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA
| | - Alexander M. Wolff
- Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of California, Merced, CA 95340, USA
| | - Virendra K. Tiwari
- Department of Chemistry, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, NE 68588, USA
| | - Nivesh Kumar
- Department of Chemistry, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, NE 68588, USA
| | - David B. Berkowitz
- Department of Chemistry, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, NE 68588, USA
| | - Ryan G. Hadt
- Division of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA
| | - Michael C. Thompson
- Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of California, Merced, CA 95340, USA
| | - Alec H. Follmer
- Department of Chemistry, University of California-Irvine, Irvine, CA 92697, USA
| | - Michael E. Wall
- Computer, Computational, and Statistical Sciences Division, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, NM 875405, USA
| | - Mark A. Wilson
- Department of Biochemistry and Redox Biology Center, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, NE 68588, USA
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31
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Sari L, Bali S, Joachimiak LA, Lin MM. Hairpin trimer transition state of amyloid fibril. Nat Commun 2024; 15:2756. [PMID: 38553453 PMCID: PMC10980705 DOI: 10.1038/s41467-024-46446-x] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/24/2023] [Accepted: 02/28/2024] [Indexed: 04/02/2024] Open
Abstract
Protein fibril self-assembly is a universal transition implicated in neurodegenerative diseases. Although fibril structure/growth are well characterized, fibril nucleation is poorly understood. Here, we use a computational-experimental approach to resolve fibril nucleation. We show that monomer hairpin content quantified from molecular dynamics simulations is predictive of experimental fibril formation kinetics across a tau motif mutant library. Hairpin trimers are predicted to be fibril transition states; one hairpin spontaneously converts into the cross-beta conformation, templating subsequent fibril growth. We designed a disulfide-linked dimer mimicking the transition state that catalyzes fibril formation, measured by ThT fluorescence and TEM, of wild-type motif - which does not normally fibrillize. A dimer compatible with extended conformations but not the transition-state fails to nucleate fibril at any concentration. Tau repeat domain simulations show how long-range interactions sequester this motif in a mutation-dependent manner. This work implies that different fibril morphologies could arise from disease-dependent hairpin seeding from different loci.
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Affiliation(s)
- Levent Sari
- Green Center for Systems Biology, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, TX, USA
- Lyda Hill Department of Bioinformatics, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, TX, USA
| | - Sofia Bali
- Molecular Biophysics Graduate Program, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, TX, USA
- Center for Alzheimer's and Neurodegenerative Diseases, Peter O'Donnell Jr. Brain Institute, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, TX, USA
| | - Lukasz A Joachimiak
- Center for Alzheimer's and Neurodegenerative Diseases, Peter O'Donnell Jr. Brain Institute, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, TX, USA
- Department of Biochemistry, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, TX, USA
| | - Milo M Lin
- Green Center for Systems Biology, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, TX, USA.
- Lyda Hill Department of Bioinformatics, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, TX, USA.
- Center for Alzheimer's and Neurodegenerative Diseases, Peter O'Donnell Jr. Brain Institute, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, TX, USA.
- Department of Biophysics, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, TX, USA.
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32
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Amisaki T. Multilevel superposition for deciphering the conformational variability of protein ensembles. Brief Bioinform 2024; 25:bbae137. [PMID: 38557679 PMCID: PMC10983786 DOI: 10.1093/bib/bbae137] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/26/2023] [Revised: 02/14/2024] [Accepted: 03/10/2024] [Indexed: 04/04/2024] Open
Abstract
The dynamics and variability of protein conformations are directly linked to their functions. Many comparative studies of X-ray protein structures have been conducted to elucidate the relevant conformational changes, dynamics and heterogeneity. The rapid increase in the number of experimentally determined structures has made comparison an effective tool for investigating protein structures. For example, it is now possible to compare structural ensembles formed by enzyme species, variants or the type of ligands bound to them. In this study, the author developed a multilevel model for estimating two covariance matrices that represent inter- and intra-ensemble variability in the Cartesian coordinate space. Principal component analysis using the two estimated covariance matrices identified the inter-/intra-enzyme variabilities, which seemed to be important for the enzyme functions, with the illustrative examples of cytochrome P450 family 2 enzymes and class A $\beta$-lactamases. In P450, in which each enzyme has its own active site of a distinct size, an active-site motion shared universally between the enzymes was captured as the first principal mode of the intra-enzyme covariance matrix. In this case, the method was useful for understanding the conformational variability after adjusting for the differences between enzyme sizes. The developed method is advantageous in small ensemble-size problems and hence promising for use in comparative studies on experimentally determined structures where ensemble sizes are smaller than those generated, for example, by molecular dynamics simulations.
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Affiliation(s)
- Takashi Amisaki
- Department of Biological Regulation, Faculty of Medicine, Tottori University, Yonago, Tottori 683-8503, Japan
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33
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Monteiro da Silva G, Cui JY, Dalgarno DC, Lisi GP, Rubenstein BM. High-throughput prediction of protein conformational distributions with subsampled AlphaFold2. Nat Commun 2024; 15:2464. [PMID: 38538622 PMCID: PMC10973385 DOI: 10.1038/s41467-024-46715-9] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/03/2023] [Accepted: 02/28/2024] [Indexed: 04/12/2024] Open
Abstract
This paper presents an innovative approach for predicting the relative populations of protein conformations using AlphaFold 2, an AI-powered method that has revolutionized biology by enabling the accurate prediction of protein structures. While AlphaFold 2 has shown exceptional accuracy and speed, it is designed to predict proteins' ground state conformations and is limited in its ability to predict conformational landscapes. Here, we demonstrate how AlphaFold 2 can directly predict the relative populations of different protein conformations by subsampling multiple sequence alignments. We tested our method against nuclear magnetic resonance experiments on two proteins with drastically different amounts of available sequence data, Abl1 kinase and the granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor, and predicted changes in their relative state populations with more than 80% accuracy. Our subsampling approach worked best when used to qualitatively predict the effects of mutations or evolution on the conformational landscape and well-populated states of proteins. It thus offers a fast and cost-effective way to predict the relative populations of protein conformations at even single-point mutation resolution, making it a useful tool for pharmacology, analysis of experimental results, and predicting evolution.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Jennifer Y Cui
- Brown University Department of Molecular and Cell Biology and Biochemistry, Providence, RI, USA
| | | | - George P Lisi
- Brown University Department of Molecular and Cell Biology and Biochemistry, Providence, RI, USA
- Brown University Department of Chemistry, Providence, RI, USA
| | - Brenda M Rubenstein
- Brown University Department of Molecular and Cell Biology and Biochemistry, Providence, RI, USA.
- Brown University Department of Chemistry, Providence, RI, USA.
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34
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Anderson JW, Vaisar D, Jones DN, Pegram LM, Vigers GP, Chen H, Moffat JG, Ahn NG. Conformation selection by ATP-competitive inhibitors and allosteric communication in ERK2. eLife 2024; 12:RP91507. [PMID: 38537148 PMCID: PMC10972564 DOI: 10.7554/elife.91507] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 04/04/2024] Open
Abstract
Activation of the extracellular signal-regulated kinase-2 (ERK2) by phosphorylation has been shown to involve changes in protein dynamics, as determined by hydrogen-deuterium exchange mass spectrometry (HDX-MS) and NMR relaxation dispersion measurements. These can be described by a global exchange between two conformational states of the active kinase, named 'L' and 'R,' where R is associated with a catalytically productive ATP-binding mode. An ATP-competitive ERK1/2 inhibitor, Vertex-11e, has properties of conformation selection for the R-state, revealing movements of the activation loop that are allosterically coupled to the kinase active site. However, the features of inhibitors important for R-state selection are unknown. Here, we survey a panel of ATP-competitive ERK inhibitors using HDX-MS and NMR and identify 14 new molecules with properties of R-state selection. They reveal effects propagated to distal regions in the P+1 and helix αF segments surrounding the activation loop, as well as helix αL16. Crystal structures of inhibitor complexes with ERK2 reveal systematic shifts in the Gly loop and helix αC, mediated by a Tyr-Tyr ring stacking interaction and the conserved Lys-Glu salt bridge. The findings suggest a model for the R-state involving small movements in the N-lobe that promote compactness within the kinase active site and alter mobility surrounding the activation loop. Such properties of conformation selection might be exploited to modulate the protein docking interface used by ERK substrates and effectors.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jake W Anderson
- Department of Biochemistry, University of ColoradoBoulderUnited States
| | - David Vaisar
- Department of Biochemistry, University of ColoradoBoulderUnited States
| | - David N Jones
- Department of Pharmacology, University of Colorado Anschutz Medical CenterBoulderUnited States
| | - Laurel M Pegram
- Department of Biochemistry, University of ColoradoBoulderUnited States
| | | | - Huifen Chen
- Genentech, Inc.South San FranciscoUnited States
| | | | - Natalie G Ahn
- Department of Biochemistry, University of ColoradoBoulderUnited States
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35
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de Haas RJ, Brunette N, Goodson A, Dauparas J, Yi SY, Yang EC, Dowling Q, Nguyen H, Kang A, Bera AK, Sankaran B, de Vries R, Baker D, King NP. Rapid and automated design of two-component protein nanomaterials using ProteinMPNN. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 2024; 121:e2314646121. [PMID: 38502697 PMCID: PMC10990136 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2314646121] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/24/2023] [Accepted: 02/20/2024] [Indexed: 03/21/2024] Open
Abstract
The design of protein-protein interfaces using physics-based design methods such as Rosetta requires substantial computational resources and manual refinement by expert structural biologists. Deep learning methods promise to simplify protein-protein interface design and enable its application to a wide variety of problems by researchers from various scientific disciplines. Here, we test the ability of a deep learning method for protein sequence design, ProteinMPNN, to design two-component tetrahedral protein nanomaterials and benchmark its performance against Rosetta. ProteinMPNN had a similar success rate to Rosetta, yielding 13 new experimentally confirmed assemblies, but required orders of magnitude less computation and no manual refinement. The interfaces designed by ProteinMPNN were substantially more polar than those designed by Rosetta, which facilitated in vitro assembly of the designed nanomaterials from independently purified components. Crystal structures of several of the assemblies confirmed the accuracy of the design method at high resolution. Our results showcase the potential of deep learning-based methods to unlock the widespread application of designed protein-protein interfaces and self-assembling protein nanomaterials in biotechnology.
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Affiliation(s)
- Robbert J. de Haas
- Department of Physical Chemistry and Soft Matter, Wageningen University and Research, Wageningen6078 WE, The Netherlands
| | - Natalie Brunette
- Department of Biochemistry, University of Washington, Seattle, WA98195
- Institute for Protein Design, University of Washington, Seattle, WA98195
| | - Alex Goodson
- Department of Biochemistry, University of Washington, Seattle, WA98195
- Institute for Protein Design, University of Washington, Seattle, WA98195
| | - Justas Dauparas
- Department of Biochemistry, University of Washington, Seattle, WA98195
- Institute for Protein Design, University of Washington, Seattle, WA98195
| | - Sue Y. Yi
- Department of Biochemistry, University of Washington, Seattle, WA98195
- Institute for Protein Design, University of Washington, Seattle, WA98195
| | - Erin C. Yang
- Department of Biochemistry, University of Washington, Seattle, WA98195
- Institute for Protein Design, University of Washington, Seattle, WA98195
| | - Quinton Dowling
- Department of Biochemistry, University of Washington, Seattle, WA98195
- Institute for Protein Design, University of Washington, Seattle, WA98195
| | - Hannah Nguyen
- Department of Biochemistry, University of Washington, Seattle, WA98195
- Institute for Protein Design, University of Washington, Seattle, WA98195
| | - Alex Kang
- Department of Biochemistry, University of Washington, Seattle, WA98195
- Institute for Protein Design, University of Washington, Seattle, WA98195
| | - Asim K. Bera
- Department of Biochemistry, University of Washington, Seattle, WA98195
- Institute for Protein Design, University of Washington, Seattle, WA98195
| | - Banumathi Sankaran
- Molecular Biophysics and Integrated Bioimaging, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, CA94720
| | - Renko de Vries
- Department of Physical Chemistry and Soft Matter, Wageningen University and Research, Wageningen6078 WE, The Netherlands
| | - David Baker
- Department of Biochemistry, University of Washington, Seattle, WA98195
- Institute for Protein Design, University of Washington, Seattle, WA98195
- HHMI, Seattle, WA98195
| | - Neil P. King
- Department of Biochemistry, University of Washington, Seattle, WA98195
- Institute for Protein Design, University of Washington, Seattle, WA98195
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36
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Kienlein M, Zacharias M, Reif MM. Comprehensive Analysis of Coupled Proline Cis-Trans States in Bradykinin Using ωBP-REMD Simulations. J Chem Theory Comput 2024; 20:2643-2654. [PMID: 38465868 DOI: 10.1021/acs.jctc.3c01356] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 03/12/2024]
Abstract
It is well-known that proline (Pro) cis-trans isomerization plays a decisive role in the folding and stabilization of proteins. The conformational coupling between isomerization states of different Pro residues in proteins during conformational adaptation processes is not well understood. In the present work, we investigate the coupled cis-trans isomerization of three Pro residues using bradykinin (BK), a partially unstructured nonapeptide hormone, as a model system. We use a recently developed enhanced-sampling molecular dynamics method (ω-bias potential replica exchange molecular dynamics; ωBP-REMD) that allows us to exhaustively sample all combinations of Pro isomer states and obtain converged probability densities of all eight state combinations within 885 ns ωBP-REMD simulations. In agreement with experiment, the all-trans state is seen to be the preferred isomer of zwitterionic aqueous BK. In about a third of its structures, this state presents the characteristic C-terminal β-turn conformation; however, other isomer combinations also contribute significantly to the structural ensemble. Unbiased probabilities can be projected onto the peptide bond dihedral angles of the three Pro residues. This unveils the interdependence of the individual Pro isomerization states, i.e., a possible coupling of the different Pro isomers. The cis/trans equilibrium of a Pro residue can change by up to 2.5 kcal·mol-1, depending on the isomerization state of other Pro residues. For example, for Pro7, the simulations indicate that its cis state becomes favored compared to its trans state when Pro2 is switched from the trans state to the cis state. Our findings demonstrate the efficiency of the ωBP-REMD methodology and suggest that the coupling of Pro isomerization states may play an even more decisive role in larger folded proteins subject to more conformational restraints.
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Affiliation(s)
- Maximilian Kienlein
- Center for Functional Protein Assemblies (CPA), Physics Department, Chair of Theoretical Biophysics (T38), Technical University of Munich, Ernst-Otto-Fischer-Str. 8, 85748 Garching, Germany
| | - Martin Zacharias
- Center for Functional Protein Assemblies (CPA), Physics Department, Chair of Theoretical Biophysics (T38), Technical University of Munich, Ernst-Otto-Fischer-Str. 8, 85748 Garching, Germany
| | - Maria M Reif
- Center for Functional Protein Assemblies (CPA), Physics Department, Chair of Theoretical Biophysics (T38), Technical University of Munich, Ernst-Otto-Fischer-Str. 8, 85748 Garching, Germany
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37
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Yang S, Song C. Switching Go̅ -Martini for Investigating Protein Conformational Transitions and Associated Protein-Lipid Interactions. J Chem Theory Comput 2024; 20:2618-2629. [PMID: 38447049 DOI: 10.1021/acs.jctc.3c01222] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 03/08/2024]
Abstract
Proteins are dynamic biomolecules that can transform between different conformational states when exerting physiological functions, which is difficult to simulate using all-atom methods. Coarse-grained (CG) Go̅-like models are widely used to investigate large-scale conformational transitions, which usually adopt implicit solvent models and therefore cannot explicitly capture the interaction between proteins and surrounding molecules, such as water and lipid molecules. Here, we present a new method, named Switching Go̅-Martini, to simulate large-scale protein conformational transitions between different states, based on the switching Go̅ method and the CG Martini 3 force field. The method is straightforward and efficient, as demonstrated by the benchmarking applications for multiple protein systems, including glutamine binding protein (GlnBP), adenylate kinase (AdK), and β2-adrenergic receptor (β2AR). Moreover, by employing the Switching Go̅-Martini method, we can not only unveil the conformational transition from the E2Pi-PL state to E1 state of the type 4 P-type ATPase (P4-ATPase) flippase ATP8A1-CDC50 but also provide insights into the intricate details of lipid transport.
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Affiliation(s)
- Song Yang
- Peking-Tsinghua Center for Life Sciences, Academy for Advanced Interdisciplinary Studies, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
- Center for Quantitative Biology, Academy for Advanced Interdisciplinary Studies, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
| | - Chen Song
- Peking-Tsinghua Center for Life Sciences, Academy for Advanced Interdisciplinary Studies, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
- Center for Quantitative Biology, Academy for Advanced Interdisciplinary Studies, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
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38
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Broz M, Oostenbrink C, Bren U. The Effect of Microwaves on Protein Structure: Molecular Dynamics Approach. J Chem Inf Model 2024; 64:2077-2083. [PMID: 38477115 DOI: 10.1021/acs.jcim.3c01937] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 03/14/2024]
Abstract
The impact of microwave (MW) irradiation on protein folding, potentially inciting misfolding, was investigated by employing molecular dynamics (MD) simulations. Twenty-nine proteins were subjected to MD simulations under equilibrium (300 K) and MW conditions, where the rotational temperature was elevated to 700 K. The utilized replacement model captures the microwave effects of δ- and γ-relaxation processes (frequency range of ∼300 MHz to ∼20 GHz). The results disclosed that MW heating incited a shift toward more compact protein conformations, as indicated by decreased root-mean-square deviations, root-mean-square fluctuations, head-to-tail distances, and radii of gyration. This compaction was attributed to the intensification of intramolecular electrostatic interactions and hydrogen bonds within the protein caused by MW-destabilized hydrogen bonds between the protein and solvent. The solvent-accessible surface area (SASA), particularly that of polar amino-acid residues, shrank under MW conditions, corresponding to a reduced polarity of the water solvent. However, MW irradiation produced no significant alterations in protein secondary structures; hence, MW heating was observed to primarily affect the protein tertiary structures.
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Affiliation(s)
- Matic Broz
- Faculty of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, University of Maribor, Smetanova ulica 17, Maribor SI-2000, Slovenia
| | - Chris Oostenbrink
- Institute of Molecular Modeling and Simulation, University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Muthgasse 18, Vienna 1190, Austria
| | - Urban Bren
- Faculty of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, University of Maribor, Smetanova ulica 17, Maribor SI-2000, Slovenia
- Faculty of Mathematics, Natural Sciences and Information Technologies, University of Primorska, Glagoljaška ulica 8, Koper SI-6000, Slovenia
- Institute of Environmental Protection and Sensors, Beloruska ulica 7, Maribor SI-2000, Slovenia
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39
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Ying W, Wang Y, Wei H, Luo Y, Ma Q, Zhu H, Janssens H, Vukašinović N, Kvasnica M, Winne JM, Gao Y, Tan S, Friml J, Liu X, Russinova E, Sun L. Structure and function of the Arabidopsis ABC transporter ABCB19 in brassinosteroid export. Science 2024; 383:eadj4591. [PMID: 38513023 DOI: 10.1126/science.adj4591] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/28/2023] [Accepted: 02/02/2024] [Indexed: 03/23/2024]
Abstract
Brassinosteroids are steroidal phytohormones that regulate plant development and physiology, including adaptation to environmental stresses. Brassinosteroids are synthesized in the cell interior but bind receptors at the cell surface, necessitating a yet to be identified export mechanism. Here, we show that a member of the ATP-binding cassette (ABC) transporter superfamily, ABCB19, functions as a brassinosteroid exporter. We present its structure in both the substrate-unbound and the brassinosteroid-bound states. Bioactive brassinosteroids are potent activators of ABCB19 ATP hydrolysis activity, and transport assays showed that ABCB19 transports brassinosteroids. In Arabidopsis thaliana, ABCB19 and its close homolog, ABCB1, positively regulate brassinosteroid responses. Our results uncover an elusive export mechanism for bioactive brassinosteroids that is tightly coordinated with brassinosteroid signaling.
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Affiliation(s)
- Wei Ying
- Department of Neurology of The First Affiliated Hospital of USTC, MOE Key Laboratory for Membraneless Organelles and Cellular Dynamics, Hefei National Research Center for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, Biomedical Sciences and Health Laboratory of Anhui Province, Division of Life Sciences and Medicine, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230027, China
| | - Yaowei Wang
- Department of Plant Biotechnology and Bioinformatics, Ghent University, 9052 Ghent, Belgium
- Center for Plant Systems Biology, VIB, 9052 Ghent, Belgium
| | - Hong Wei
- Department of Neurology of The First Affiliated Hospital of USTC, MOE Key Laboratory for Membraneless Organelles and Cellular Dynamics, Hefei National Research Center for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, Biomedical Sciences and Health Laboratory of Anhui Province, Division of Life Sciences and Medicine, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230027, China
| | - Yongming Luo
- Department of Plant Biotechnology and Bioinformatics, Ghent University, 9052 Ghent, Belgium
- Center for Plant Systems Biology, VIB, 9052 Ghent, Belgium
| | - Qian Ma
- Department of Plant Biotechnology and Bioinformatics, Ghent University, 9052 Ghent, Belgium
- Center for Plant Systems Biology, VIB, 9052 Ghent, Belgium
| | - Heyuan Zhu
- Department of Plant Biotechnology and Bioinformatics, Ghent University, 9052 Ghent, Belgium
- Center for Plant Systems Biology, VIB, 9052 Ghent, Belgium
| | - Hilde Janssens
- Department of Organic and Macromolecular Chemistry, Ghent University, 9000 Ghent, Belgium
| | - Nemanja Vukašinović
- Department of Plant Biotechnology and Bioinformatics, Ghent University, 9052 Ghent, Belgium
- Center for Plant Systems Biology, VIB, 9052 Ghent, Belgium
| | - Miroslav Kvasnica
- Laboratory of Growth Regulators, Institute of Experimental Botany, The Czech Academy of Sciences and Palacký University, 77900 Olomouc, Czech Republic
| | - Johan M Winne
- Department of Organic and Macromolecular Chemistry, Ghent University, 9000 Ghent, Belgium
| | - Yongxiang Gao
- Department of Neurology of The First Affiliated Hospital of USTC, MOE Key Laboratory for Membraneless Organelles and Cellular Dynamics, Hefei National Research Center for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, Biomedical Sciences and Health Laboratory of Anhui Province, Division of Life Sciences and Medicine, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230027, China
| | - Shutang Tan
- Department of Neurology of The First Affiliated Hospital of USTC, MOE Key Laboratory for Membraneless Organelles and Cellular Dynamics, Hefei National Research Center for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, Biomedical Sciences and Health Laboratory of Anhui Province, Division of Life Sciences and Medicine, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230027, China
| | - Jiří Friml
- Institute of Science and Technology Austria (ISTA), 3400 Klosterneuburg, Austria
| | - Xin Liu
- Department of Neurology of The First Affiliated Hospital of USTC, MOE Key Laboratory for Membraneless Organelles and Cellular Dynamics, Hefei National Research Center for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, Biomedical Sciences and Health Laboratory of Anhui Province, Division of Life Sciences and Medicine, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230027, China
| | - Eugenia Russinova
- Department of Plant Biotechnology and Bioinformatics, Ghent University, 9052 Ghent, Belgium
- Center for Plant Systems Biology, VIB, 9052 Ghent, Belgium
| | - Linfeng Sun
- Department of Neurology of The First Affiliated Hospital of USTC, MOE Key Laboratory for Membraneless Organelles and Cellular Dynamics, Hefei National Research Center for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, Biomedical Sciences and Health Laboratory of Anhui Province, Division of Life Sciences and Medicine, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230027, China
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40
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Odstrcil RE, Dutta P, Liu J. Enhanced Sampling for Conformational Changes and Molecular Mechanisms of Human NTHL1. J Phys Chem Lett 2024; 15:3206-3213. [PMID: 38483510 DOI: 10.1021/acs.jpclett.4c00161] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 03/22/2024]
Abstract
The functionalities of proteins rely on protein conformational changes during many processes. Identification of the protein conformations and capturing transitions among different conformations are important but extremely challenging in both experiments and simulations. In this work, we develop a machine learning based approach to identify a reaction coordinate that accelerates the exploration of protein conformational changes in molecular simulations. We implement our approach to study the conformational changes of human NTHL1 during DNA repair. Our results identified three distinct conformations: open (stable), closed (unstable), and bundle (stable). The existence of the bundle conformation can rationalize recent experimental observations. Comparison with an NTHL1 mutant demonstrates that a closely packed cluster of positively charged residues in the linker could be a factor to search when screening for genetic abnormalities. Results will lead to a better modulation of the DNA repair pathway to protect against carcinogenesis.
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Affiliation(s)
- Ryan E Odstrcil
- School of Mechanical and Materials Engineering, Washington State University, Pullman, Washington 99164, United States
| | - Prashanta Dutta
- School of Mechanical and Materials Engineering, Washington State University, Pullman, Washington 99164, United States
| | - Jin Liu
- School of Mechanical and Materials Engineering, Washington State University, Pullman, Washington 99164, United States
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41
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Hazarika S, Fehrle M, Okafor CD. How nuclear receptors transition between active and inactive forms: An energetic perspective. J Chem Phys 2024; 160:115102. [PMID: 38501469 DOI: 10.1063/5.0189234] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/27/2023] [Accepted: 02/28/2024] [Indexed: 03/20/2024] Open
Abstract
Nuclear receptors regulate transcriptional programs in response to the binding of natural and synthetic ligands. These ligands modulate the receptor by inducing dynamic changes in the ligand binding domain that shift the C-terminal helix (H12) between active and inactive conformations. Despite decades of study, many questions persist regarding the nature of the inactive state and how ligands shift receptors between different states. Here, we use molecular dynamics (MD) simulations to investigate the timescale and energetic landscape of the conformational transition between inactive and active forms of progesterone receptor (PR) bound to a partial agonist. We observe that the microsecond timescale is insufficient to observe any transitions; only at millisecond timescales achieved via accelerated MD simulations do we find the inactive PR switches to the active state. Energetic analysis reveals that both active and inactive PR states represent energy minima separated by a barrier that can be traversed. In contrast, little or no transition is observed between active and inactive states when an agonist or antagonist is bound, confirming that ligand identity plays a key role in defining the energy landscape of nuclear receptor conformations.
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Affiliation(s)
- Saurov Hazarika
- Department of Chemistry, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania 16802, USA
| | - Matthew Fehrle
- Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania 16802, USA
| | - C Denise Okafor
- Department of Chemistry, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania 16802, USA
- Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania 16802, USA
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42
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Fowler W, Deng C, Teodoro OT, de Pablo JJ, Tirrell MV. Synthetic and Computational Design Insights toward Mimicking Protein Binding of Phosphate. Bioconjug Chem 2024; 35:300-311. [PMID: 38377539 PMCID: PMC10962344 DOI: 10.1021/acs.bioconjchem.3c00454] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/16/2023] [Revised: 01/09/2024] [Accepted: 01/09/2024] [Indexed: 02/22/2024]
Abstract
The unique and precise capabilities of proteins are renowned for their specificity and range of application. Effective mimicking of protein-binding offers enticing potential to direct their abilities toward useful applications, but it is nevertheless quite difficult to realize this characteristic of protein behavior in a synthetic material. Here, we design, synthesize, and evaluate experimentally and computationally a series of multicomponent phosphate-binding peptide amphiphile micelles to derive design insights into how protein binding behavior translates to synthetic materials. By inserting the Walker A P-loop binding motif into this peptide synthetic material, we successfully implemented the protein-binding design parameters of hydrogen-bonding and electrostatic interaction to bind phosphate completely and selectively in this highly tunable synthetic platform. Moreover, in this densely arrayed peptide environment, we use molecular dynamics simulations to identify an intriguing mechanistic shift of binding that is inaccessible in traditional proteins, introducing two corresponding new design elements─flexibility and minimization of the loss of entropy due to ion binding, in protein-analogous synthetic materials. We then translate these new design factors to de novo peptide sequences that bind phosphate independent of protein-extracted sequence or conformation. Overall, this work reveals that traditional complex conformational restrictions of binding by proteins can be replaced and repurposed in a multicomponent peptide amphiphile synthetic material, opening up opportunities for future enhanced protein-inspired design.
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Affiliation(s)
- Whitney
C. Fowler
- Pritzker
School of Molecular Engineering, University
of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois 60637, United States
| | - Chuting Deng
- Pritzker
School of Molecular Engineering, University
of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois 60637, United States
| | - O. Therese Teodoro
- Pritzker
School of Molecular Engineering, University
of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois 60637, United States
| | - Juan J. de Pablo
- Pritzker
School of Molecular Engineering, University
of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois 60637, United States
- Argonne
National Laboratory, Lemont, Illinois 60439, United States
| | - Matthew V. Tirrell
- Pritzker
School of Molecular Engineering, University
of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois 60637, United States
- Argonne
National Laboratory, Lemont, Illinois 60439, United States
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43
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Zinovjev K, Guénon P, Ramos-Guzmán CA, Ruiz-Pernía JJ, Laage D, Tuñón I. Activation and friction in enzymatic loop opening and closing dynamics. Nat Commun 2024; 15:2490. [PMID: 38509080 PMCID: PMC10955111 DOI: 10.1038/s41467-024-46723-9] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/02/2023] [Accepted: 03/04/2024] [Indexed: 03/22/2024] Open
Abstract
Protein loop dynamics have recently been recognized as central to enzymatic activity, specificity and stability. However, the factors controlling loop opening and closing kinetics have remained elusive. Here, we combine molecular dynamics simulations with string-method determination of complex reaction coordinates to elucidate the molecular mechanism and rate-limiting step for WPD-loop dynamics in the PTP1B enzyme. While protein conformational dynamics is often represented as diffusive motion hindered by solvent viscosity and internal friction, we demonstrate that loop opening and closing is activated. It is governed by torsional rearrangement around a single loop peptide group and by significant friction caused by backbone adjustments, which can dynamically trap the loop. Considering both torsional barrier and time-dependent friction, our calculated rate constants exhibit very good agreement with experimental measurements, reproducing the change in loop opening kinetics between proteins. Furthermore, we demonstrate the applicability of our results to other enzymatic loops, including the M20 DHFR loop, thereby offering prospects for loop engineering potentially leading to enhanced designs.
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Affiliation(s)
- Kirill Zinovjev
- Departamento de Química Física, Universidad de Valencia, 46100, Burjasot, Spain
| | - Paul Guénon
- Departamento de Química Física, Universidad de Valencia, 46100, Burjasot, Spain
- PASTEUR, Département de Chimie, École Normale Supérieure, PSL University, Sorbonne Université, CNRS, 75005, Paris, France
| | - Carlos A Ramos-Guzmán
- Departamento de Química Física, Universidad de Valencia, 46100, Burjasot, Spain
- Instituto de Materiales Avanzados, Universidad Jaume I, 12071, Castelló, Spain
| | | | - Damien Laage
- PASTEUR, Département de Chimie, École Normale Supérieure, PSL University, Sorbonne Université, CNRS, 75005, Paris, France
| | - Iñaki Tuñón
- Departamento de Química Física, Universidad de Valencia, 46100, Burjasot, Spain.
- PASTEUR, Département de Chimie, École Normale Supérieure, PSL University, Sorbonne Université, CNRS, 75005, Paris, France.
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44
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Kaziannis S, Broser M, van Stokkum IHM, Dostal J, Busse W, Munhoven A, Bernardo C, Kloz M, Hegemann P, Kennis JTM. Multiple retinal isomerizations during the early phase of the bestrhodopsin photoreaction. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 2024; 121:e2318996121. [PMID: 38478688 PMCID: PMC10962995 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2318996121] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/01/2023] [Accepted: 02/13/2024] [Indexed: 03/27/2024] Open
Abstract
Bestrhodopsins constitute a class of light-regulated pentameric ion channels that consist of one or two rhodopsins in tandem fused with bestrophin ion channel domains. Here, we report on the isomerization dynamics in the rhodopsin tandem domains of Phaeocystis antarctica bestrhodopsin, which binds all-trans retinal Schiff-base (RSB) absorbing at 661 nm and, upon illumination, converts to the meta-stable P540 state with an unusual 11-cis RSB. The primary photoproduct P682 corresponds to a mixture of highly distorted 11-cis and 13-cis RSB directly formed from the excited state in 1.4 ps. P673 evolves from P682 in 500 ps and contains highly distorted 13-cis RSB, indicating that the 11-cis fraction in P682 converts to 13-cis. Next, P673 establishes an equilibrium with P595 in 1.2 µs, during which RSB converts to 11-cis and then further proceeds to P560 in 48 µs and P540 in 1.0 ms while remaining 11-cis. Hence, extensive isomeric switching occurs on the early ground state potential energy surface (PES) on the hundreds of ps to µs timescale before finally settling on a metastable 11-cis photoproduct. We propose that P682 and P673 are trapped high up on the ground-state PES after passing through either of two closely located conical intersections that result in 11-cis and 13-cis RSB. Co-rotation of C11=C12 and C13=C14 bonds results in a constricted conformational landscape that allows thermal switching between 11-cis and 13-cis species of highly strained RSB chromophores. Protein relaxation may release RSB strain, allowing it to evolve to a stable 11-cis isomeric configuration in microseconds.
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Affiliation(s)
- Spyridon Kaziannis
- The Extreme Light Infrastructure ERIC, Dolní Břežany252 41, Czech Republic
- Department of Physics, University of Ioannina, IoanninaGr-45110, Greece
| | - Matthias Broser
- Faculty of Life Sciences, Institute for Biology, Experimental Biophysics, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, BerlinD-10115, Germany
| | - Ivo H. M. van Stokkum
- Department of Physics and Astronomy, Faculty of Science, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam1081 HV, The Netherlands
| | - Jakub Dostal
- The Extreme Light Infrastructure ERIC, Dolní Břežany252 41, Czech Republic
| | - Wayne Busse
- Faculty of Life Sciences, Institute for Biology, Experimental Biophysics, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, BerlinD-10115, Germany
| | - Arno Munhoven
- Faculty of Life Sciences, Institute for Biology, Experimental Biophysics, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, BerlinD-10115, Germany
| | - Cesar Bernardo
- The Extreme Light Infrastructure ERIC, Dolní Břežany252 41, Czech Republic
| | - Miroslav Kloz
- The Extreme Light Infrastructure ERIC, Dolní Břežany252 41, Czech Republic
| | - Peter Hegemann
- Faculty of Life Sciences, Institute for Biology, Experimental Biophysics, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, BerlinD-10115, Germany
| | - John T. M. Kennis
- Department of Physics and Astronomy, Faculty of Science, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam1081 HV, The Netherlands
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45
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Bagheri N, Chen H, Rabasovic M, Widengren J. Non-fluorescent transient states of tyrosine as a basis for label-free protein conformation and interaction studies. Sci Rep 2024; 14:6464. [PMID: 38499633 PMCID: PMC10948778 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-024-57054-6] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/21/2023] [Accepted: 03/13/2024] [Indexed: 03/20/2024] Open
Abstract
The amino acids tryptophan, tyrosine, and phenylalanine have been extensively used for different label-free protein studies, based on the intensity, lifetime, wavelength and/or polarization of their emitted fluorescence. Similar to most fluorescent organic molecules, these amino acids can undergo transitions into dark meta-stable states, such as triplet and photo-radical states. On the one hand, these transitions limit the fluorescence signal, but they are also highly environment-sensitive and can offer an additional set of parameters, reflecting interactions, folding states, and immediate environments around the proteins. In this work, by analyzing the average intensity of tyrosine emission under different excitation modulations with the transient state monitoring (TRAST) technique, we explored the photo physics of tyrosine as a basis for such environment-sensitive readouts. From how the dark state transitions of tyrosine varied with excitation intensity and solvent conditions we first established a photophysical model for tyrosine. Next, we studied Calmodulin (containing two tyrosines), and how its conformation is changed upon calcium binding. From these TRAST experiments, performed with 280 nm time-modulated excitation, we show that tyrosine dark state transitions clearly change with the calmodulin conformation, and may thus represent a useful source of information for (label-free) analyses of protein conformations and interactions.
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Affiliation(s)
- Niusha Bagheri
- Experimental Biomolecular Physics, Department of Applied Physics, Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), Albanova University Center, 106 91, Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Hongjian Chen
- Experimental Biomolecular Physics, Department of Applied Physics, Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), Albanova University Center, 106 91, Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Mihailo Rabasovic
- Laboratory for Biophysics, Institute of Physics Belgrade, Pregrevica 118, 11080, Zemun-Belgrade, Serbia
| | - Jerker Widengren
- Experimental Biomolecular Physics, Department of Applied Physics, Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), Albanova University Center, 106 91, Stockholm, Sweden.
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46
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Wijerathne T, Lacroix J. Voltage-clamp fluorometry to record flow-activated PIEZO1 currents and fluorometric signals. STAR Protoc 2024; 5:102789. [PMID: 38103195 PMCID: PMC10770629 DOI: 10.1016/j.xpro.2023.102789] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/14/2023] [Revised: 11/13/2023] [Accepted: 12/01/2023] [Indexed: 12/18/2023] Open
Abstract
PIEZO channels sense mechanical forces through conformational rearrangements of a mechanosensory domain called blade. To probe these rearrangements in real time, we have inserted conformational-sensitive cyclic-permuted GFP into several positions of PIEZO1's blade. Here, we describe the step-by-step experimental procedure we developed to simultaneously measure flow-activated ionic currents and fluorometric signals in cells expressing these engineered constructs. We describe steps for performing transfection, seeding cells on coverslips, setting up a perfusion-based fluid shear application system, and performing voltage-clamp fluorometry. For complete details on the use and execution of this protocol, please refer to Ozkan et al. (2023).1.
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Affiliation(s)
- Tharaka Wijerathne
- Department of Basic Medical Sciences, Western University of Health Sciences, 309 East Second St., Pomona, CA 91766, USA
| | - Jerome Lacroix
- Department of Basic Medical Sciences, Western University of Health Sciences, 309 East Second St., Pomona, CA 91766, USA.
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47
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Dedden D, Nitsche J, Schneider EV, Thomsen M, Schwarz D, Leuthner B, Grädler U. Cryo-EM Structures of CRAF 2/14-3-3 2 and CRAF 2/14-3-3 2/MEK1 2 Complexes. J Mol Biol 2024; 436:168483. [PMID: 38331211 DOI: 10.1016/j.jmb.2024.168483] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/15/2023] [Revised: 12/22/2023] [Accepted: 02/02/2024] [Indexed: 02/10/2024]
Abstract
RAF protein kinases are essential effectors in the MAPK pathway and are important cancer drug targets. Structural understanding of RAF activation is so far based on cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM) and X-ray structures of BRAF in different conformational states as inactive or active complexes with KRAS, 14-3-3 and MEK1. In this study, we have solved the first cryo-EM structures of CRAF2/14-3-32 at 3.4 Å resolution and CRAF2/14-3-32/MEK12 at 4.2 Å resolution using CRAF kinase domain expressed as constitutively active Y340D/Y341D mutant in insect cells. The overall architecture of our CRAF2/14-3-32 and CRAF2/14-3-32/MEK12 cryo-EM structures is highly similar to corresponding BRAF structures in complex with 14-3-3 or 14-3-3/MEK1 and represent the activated dimeric RAF conformation. Our CRAF cryo-EM structures provide additional insights into structural understanding of the activated CRAF2/14-3-32/MEK12 complex.
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Affiliation(s)
- Dirk Dedden
- Proteros biostructures GmbH, Bunsenstraße 7a, D-82152 Planegg-Martinsried, Germany
| | - Julius Nitsche
- Proteros biostructures GmbH, Bunsenstraße 7a, D-82152 Planegg-Martinsried, Germany
| | | | - Maren Thomsen
- Proteros biostructures GmbH, Bunsenstraße 7a, D-82152 Planegg-Martinsried, Germany
| | - Daniel Schwarz
- The Healthcare Business of Merck KGaA, Frankfurter Str. 250, 64293 Darmstadt, Germany
| | - Birgitta Leuthner
- The Healthcare Business of Merck KGaA, Frankfurter Str. 250, 64293 Darmstadt, Germany
| | - Ulrich Grädler
- The Healthcare Business of Merck KGaA, Frankfurter Str. 250, 64293 Darmstadt, Germany.
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48
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Christoffer C, Harini K, Archit G, Kihara D. Assembly of Protein Complexes in and on the Membrane with Predicted Spatial Arrangement Constraints. J Mol Biol 2024; 436:168486. [PMID: 38336197 PMCID: PMC10942765 DOI: 10.1016/j.jmb.2024.168486] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/08/2023] [Revised: 01/17/2024] [Accepted: 02/05/2024] [Indexed: 02/12/2024]
Abstract
Membrane proteins play crucial roles in various cellular processes, and their interactions with other proteins in and on the membrane are essential for their proper functioning. While an increasing number of structures of more membrane proteins are being determined, the available structure data is still sparse. To gain insights into the mechanisms of membrane protein complexes, computational docking methods are necessary due to the challenge of experimental determination. Here, we introduce Mem-LZerD, a rigid-body membrane docking algorithm designed to take advantage of modern membrane modeling and protein docking techniques to facilitate the docking of membrane protein complexes. Mem-LZerD is based on the LZerD protein docking algorithm, which has been constantly among the top servers in many rounds of CAPRI protein docking assessment. By employing a combination of geometric hashing, newly constrained by the predicted membrane height and tilt angle, and model scoring accounting for the energy of membrane insertion, we demonstrate the capability of Mem-LZerD to model diverse membrane protein-protein complexes. Mem-LZerD successfully performed unbound docking on 13 of 21 (61.9%) transmembrane complexes in an established benchmark, more than shown by previous approaches. It was additionally tested on new datasets of 44 transmembrane complexes and 92 peripheral membrane protein complexes, of which it successfully modeled 35 (79.5%) and 15 (16.3%) complexes respectively. When non-blind orientations of peripheral targets were included, the number of successes increased to 54 (58.7%). We further demonstrate that Mem-LZerD produces complex models which are suitable for molecular dynamics simulation. Mem-LZerD is made available at https://lzerd.kiharalab.org.
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Affiliation(s)
- Charles Christoffer
- Department of Computer Science, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN 47907, USA
| | - Kannan Harini
- Department of Biotechnology, Bhupat and Jyoti Mehta School of Biosciences, Indian Institute of Technology Madras, Chennai 600036, India; Department of Biological Sciences, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN 47907, USA
| | - Gupta Archit
- Department of Biological Sciences, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN 47907, USA; Department of Genetic Engineering, SRM Institute of Science and Technology, Kattankulathur 603203, India
| | - Daisuke Kihara
- Department of Computer Science, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN 47907, USA; Department of Biological Sciences, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN 47907, USA; Purdue University Center for Cancer Research, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN 47907, USA.
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49
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Liu Y, Zhangding Z, Liu X, Gan T, Ai C, Wu J, Liang H, Chen M, Guo Y, Lu R, Jiang Y, Ji X, Gao N, Kong D, Li Q, Hu J. Fork coupling directs DNA replication elongation and termination. Science 2024; 383:1215-1222. [PMID: 38484065 DOI: 10.1126/science.adj7606] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/19/2023] [Accepted: 02/09/2024] [Indexed: 03/19/2024]
Abstract
DNA replication is initiated at multiple loci to ensure timely duplication of eukaryotic genomes. Sister replication forks progress bidirectionally, and replication terminates when two convergent forks encounter one another. To investigate the coordination of replication forks, we developed a replication-associated in situ HiC method to capture chromatin interactions involving nascent DNA. We identify more than 2000 fountain-like structures of chromatin contacts in human and mouse genomes, indicative of coupling of DNA replication forks. Replication fork interaction not only occurs between sister forks but also involves forks from two distinct origins to predetermine replication termination. Termination-associated chromatin fountains are sensitive to replication stress and lead to coupled forks-associated genomic deletions in cancers. These findings reveal the spatial organization of DNA replication forks within the chromatin context.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yang Liu
- The MOE Key Laboratory of Cell Proliferation and Differentiation, School of Life Sciences, Genome Editing Research Center, Peking University; Beijing 100871, China
- PKU-THU Center for Life Sciences, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
| | - Zhengrong Zhangding
- The MOE Key Laboratory of Cell Proliferation and Differentiation, School of Life Sciences, Genome Editing Research Center, Peking University; Beijing 100871, China
| | - Xuhao Liu
- The MOE Key Laboratory of Cell Proliferation and Differentiation, School of Life Sciences, Genome Editing Research Center, Peking University; Beijing 100871, China
| | - Tingting Gan
- The MOE Key Laboratory of Cell Proliferation and Differentiation, School of Life Sciences, Genome Editing Research Center, Peking University; Beijing 100871, China
- PKU-THU Center for Life Sciences, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
- Peking University ChengDu Academy for Advanced Interdisciplinary Biotechnologies, Chengdu, Sichuan 610213, China
| | - Chen Ai
- The MOE Key Laboratory of Cell Proliferation and Differentiation, School of Life Sciences, Genome Editing Research Center, Peking University; Beijing 100871, China
- PKU-THU Center for Life Sciences, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
| | - Jinchun Wu
- The MOE Key Laboratory of Cell Proliferation and Differentiation, School of Life Sciences, Genome Editing Research Center, Peking University; Beijing 100871, China
- PKU-THU Center for Life Sciences, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
| | - Haoxin Liang
- The MOE Key Laboratory of Cell Proliferation and Differentiation, School of Life Sciences, Genome Editing Research Center, Peking University; Beijing 100871, China
| | - Mohan Chen
- The MOE Key Laboratory of Cell Proliferation and Differentiation, School of Life Sciences, Genome Editing Research Center, Peking University; Beijing 100871, China
| | - Yuefeng Guo
- The MOE Key Laboratory of Cell Proliferation and Differentiation, School of Life Sciences, Genome Editing Research Center, Peking University; Beijing 100871, China
| | - Rusen Lu
- The MOE Key Laboratory of Cell Proliferation and Differentiation, School of Life Sciences, Genome Editing Research Center, Peking University; Beijing 100871, China
- PKU-THU Center for Life Sciences, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
| | - Yongpeng Jiang
- The MOE Key Laboratory of Cell Proliferation and Differentiation, School of Life Sciences, Genome Editing Research Center, Peking University; Beijing 100871, China
- PKU-THU Center for Life Sciences, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
| | - Xiong Ji
- The MOE Key Laboratory of Cell Proliferation and Differentiation, School of Life Sciences, Genome Editing Research Center, Peking University; Beijing 100871, China
- PKU-THU Center for Life Sciences, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
| | - Ning Gao
- PKU-THU Center for Life Sciences, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
- State Key Laboratory of Membrane Biology, School of Life Sciences, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
| | - Daochun Kong
- PKU-THU Center for Life Sciences, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
- State Key Laboratory of Protein and Plant Gene Research, School of Life Sciences, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
| | - Qing Li
- PKU-THU Center for Life Sciences, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
- State Key Laboratory of Protein and Plant Gene Research, School of Life Sciences, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
| | - Jiazhi Hu
- The MOE Key Laboratory of Cell Proliferation and Differentiation, School of Life Sciences, Genome Editing Research Center, Peking University; Beijing 100871, China
- PKU-THU Center for Life Sciences, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
- Peking University ChengDu Academy for Advanced Interdisciplinary Biotechnologies, Chengdu, Sichuan 610213, China
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50
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Dai X, Yang J, Lv L, Wang C, Bian L. Molecular recognition and binding between human plasminogen Kringle 5 and α-chain of human complement component C3b by frontal chromatography and dynamics simulation. J Chromatogr A 2024; 1718:464673. [PMID: 38340457 DOI: 10.1016/j.chroma.2024.464673] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/11/2023] [Revised: 01/11/2024] [Accepted: 01/22/2024] [Indexed: 02/12/2024]
Abstract
The binding and molecular recognition between α-chain of human complement C3b (α-chain of C3b) and human plasminogen Kringle 5 (Kringle 5) were studied and explored by frontal chromatography and dynamics simulation in the combination of bio-specific technologies. The specific interaction between the α-chain of C3b and Kringle 5 was initially confirmed by ligand blot and ELISA (Kd = 4.243×10-6 L/mol). Furthermore, the binding determination conducted via frontal chromatography showed that the presence of a single binding site between them, with the binding constant of 2.98 × 105 L/mol. Then the molecular recognition by dynamics simulation and molecular docking showed that there were 9 and 13 amino acid residues respective in the Kringle 5 and α-chain of C3b directly implicated in the binding and the main stabilizing forces were electrostatic force (-55.99 ± 11.82 kcal/mol) and Van der Waals forces (-42.70 ± 3.45 kcal/mol). Additionally, a loop structure (65-71) in Kringle 5 underwent a conformational change from a random structure to an α-helix and a loop structure (417-425) in α-chain of C3b was closer to the molecular center, both of them were more conducive to the binding between them. Meanwhile, the involvement of the lysine binding site of Kringle 5 played an important role in the binding process. In addition, the erythrocyte-antibody complement rosette assay substantiated that the presence of Kringle 5 hindered the transportation of α-chain of C3b to antigen-antibody complex in a dose-dependent manner. These findings collectively indicated that the α-chain of C3b is very likely a receptor protein for Kringle 5, which provides a methodology for other similar investigations and valuable insights into expansion of the pharmacological effects and potential application of Kringle 5 in immune-related diseases.
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Affiliation(s)
- Xufen Dai
- College of Life Science, Northwest University, Xi'an 710069, China
| | - Jian Yang
- College of Life Science, Northwest University, Xi'an 710069, China
| | - Longquan Lv
- College of Life Science, Northwest University, Xi'an 710069, China
| | - Cuiling Wang
- College of Life Science, Northwest University, Xi'an 710069, China
| | - Liujiao Bian
- College of Life Science, Northwest University, Xi'an 710069, China.
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