Crystal structure Recombination

X-ray structure of aequorin (Head et al., 2000). X-ray crystallography was performed with the recombinant aequorin prepared by the improved method described above. The crystals of recombinant aequorin were grown in a high concentration of ammonium sulfate. The results revealed that aequorin is a globular molecule containing a... 

Fig. 4.1.13 A ribbon representation of the crystal structure of recombinant acquorin molecule showing the secondary structure elements in the protein. Alpha-helices are denoted in cyan, beta-sheet in yellow, loops in magenta coelenterazine (yellow) and the side chain of tyrosine 184 are shown as stick representations. From Head et al., 2000, with permission from Macmillan Publishers.

One of the best-studied carrier molecules is produced as a primary excretory constituent of the adult male mouse, known from its consistent high concentration as the major urinary protein (MUP). The basic 3-D structure of the protein was initially obtained from a monoclinic crystal of recombinant protein (MUP-I), constructed by induction in a bacterial expression system and purified to homogeneity (Kuser, 1990). A wild type version of MUP finally yielded to NMR analysis a clone of the r-isoform (162 residues) was labelled and compared with the crystal-structure (Lucke et al., 1990). Two views of the molecule... 

This approach is not restricted to bacterial or viral cells. Mammalian cells under highly proliferating conditions can be cultured at increasing exposure to a compound in attempts to create resistant mutants. Alternatively, one can sometimes use a structural biology approach to predict amino acid changes that would abrogate inhibitor affinity from study of enzyme-inhibitor complex crystal structures. If the recombinant mutant enzyme displays the diminished inhibitor potency expected, one can then devise ways of expressing the mutant enzyme in a cell type of interest and look to see if the cellular phenotype is likewise abolished by the mutation. 

Kraut, Crystal structures of recombinant dihydrofolate reductase complexed with folate and 5-deazafolate, Biochemistry 29 9467 (1990). 

MacGillivray, R.T., Moore, S.A., Chen, J., Anderson, B.F., Baker, H., Luo, Y., Bewley, M., Smith, C.A., Murphy, M.E., Wang, Y., Mason, A.B., Woodworth, R.C., Brayer, G.D. and Baker, E.N. (1998) Two high-resolution crystal structures of the recombinant N-lobe of human transferrin reveal a structural change implicated in iron release, Biochemistry, 37, 7919-7928. 

STRUCTURE FAMILIES RECOMBINATION STRUCTURES , MODULAR ASPECTS OF CRYSTAL STRUCTURES... 

Type X collagen has a single al chain, which contains a short collagenous domain of 460 residues, flanked by an N-terminal NC domain of 37 residues and C-terminal NC domain of 161 residues." Its protomer is a homotrimer. The C-terminal NC domain is responsible for trimerization and multimer formation, which is based on experiments with recombinant domains." The crystal structure of type X collagen trimerization domain is similar to that of type VIII collagen (see also Section 5.16.6.5). 

Various isoforms of both HO and NOS can be expressed in recombinant systems. As a result, the immediate future will undoubtedly witness a wealth of mutagenesis experiments guided by the crystal structures. It also may be possible to trap in crystalline form the various intermediates of the HO reaction cycle, which will greatly facilitate a deeper understanding of the catalytic mechanism. Conformational dynamics appear to be quite important in HO, and hence, a variety of spectral probes such as NMR and fluorescence should prove especially useful in studying the role of protein dynamics in function. Overall there should be considerable optimism for understanding HO at the level of detail achieved for peroxidases and other well-studied enz5une systems. 

Subtilisins are a class of related serine endo proteases produced by members of the Bacillus genus. The B.amvloliauefaciens subtilisin (BPN ) is well-characterized with regard to its DNA sequence 4 protein sequence (5), X-ray crystal structure (6) and kinetic properties (7). With this wealth of information available, BPN was chosen as the model enzyme for our recombinant approach. 

It is impossible to directly measure phases of diffracted X-rays. Since phases determine how the measured diffraction intensities are to be recombined into a three-dimensional electron density, phase information is required to calculate an electron density map of a crystal structure. In this chapter we discuss how prior knowledge of the statistical distribution of the electron density within a crystal can be used to extract phase information. The information can take various forms, for example ... 

From extensive analysis of recombinant proteins, and the crystal structure of A. thaliana protein, detailed reaction mechanisms have been proposed. The ANS reaction likely proceeds via stereospecific hydroxylation of the leucoanthocyanidin (flavan-3,4-cA-diol) at the C-3 to give a flavan-3,3,4-triol, which spontaneously 2,3-dehydrates and isomerizes to 2-flaven-3,4-diol, which then spontaneously isomerizes to a thermodynamically more stable anthocyanidin pseudobase, 3-flaven-2,3-diol (Figure 3.2). The formation of 3-flaven-2,3-diol via the 2-flaven-3,4-diol was previously hypothesized by Heller and Forkmann. The reaction sequence, and the subsequent formation of the anthocyanidin 3-D-glycoside, does not require activity of a separate dehydratase, which was once postulated. Recombinant ANS and uridine diphosphate (UDP)-glucose flavonoid 3-D-glucosyltransferase (F3GT, sometimes... 

Currently there is no experimentally determined three-dimensional structural information available for OSCs, although studies with a related enzyme, squa-lene-hopene cyclase (SC EC 5.4.99.7) have proved informative. SCs are involved in the direct cyclisation of squalene to pentacyclic triterpenoids known as hopanoids, which play an integral role in membrane structure in prokaryotes [ 51 ]. A number of SC genes have been cloned from bacteria [52 - 54]. The SC and OSC enzymes have related predicted amino acid sequences, and so should have similar spatial structures [55]. The crystal structure of recombinant SC from the Gram-positive bacterium Alicyclobacillus acidocaldarius has established that the enzyme is dimeric [55]. Each subunit consists of two a-a barrel domains that assemble to form a central hydrophobic cavity [55,56]. 

The analysis of the data of PS I gave quite accurate information on the distance of the spin centres (25.4 0.3 A)301 that compared well with the crystal structure data.68 A problem is the extended it-spin density distribution in the donor and acceptor. For a solid comparison a centre of gravity for the spin must be calculated from experimental or theoretical spin density distributions of the two radicals. Similar data with almost unaltered distances were obtained for PS I with other quinones substituted into the Ai site.147-302This work has been extended to other electron acceptors,303 which show a larger heterogeneity in distances. It has been shown that the lifetime of the RP can also be measured and can even be controlled in the experiments by an additional mw pulse prior to the 2-pulse echo sequence.302 This pulse transfers population to triplet levels which cannot directly recombine to the singlet ground state. This has earlier been shown for the bRC.304,305 The OOP-ESEEM technique has also been applied to various mutants of PS I to characterize them by the measured distances between fixed donor and variable acceptors.254 256-263-264... 

The division between the upper and lower lobes of the enzyme is well defined by the two major conformations of the upper lobe observed in the crystal structures of cAPK. One conformation has been observed in the orthorhombic crystals of recombinant cAPK [9,10,14] and another in the cubic... 

Tong L, Pav S, Lamarre D, Pilote L, Laplante S, Anderson PC, Jung G. High resolution crystal-structures of recombinant human renin in complex with polyhydroxymonoamide inhibitors. J Mol Biol 1995 250 211-222. 

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