French protein crystals

A solution structure of French Bean plastocyanin has been reported by Wright and co-workers,19 using nuclear magnetic resonance techniques described in Section 3.5 of Chapter 3. The structure, determined from a plastocyanin molecule in solution rather than in a solid-state crystal, agrees well with that of reduced poplar plastocyanin X-ray crystallographic structure reported above. Conformations of protein side chains constituting the hydrophobic core of the French bean plastocyanin are well-defined by the NMR technique. Surface side chains show... 

The first crystal structure information on a blue copper protein, for poplar plastocyanin in the Cu(II) state, was published in 1978 (2, 3). Since then, the Cu(I) state and related apo and Hg(II) substituted forms (5, 6), the green algal plastocyanin from Enteromorpha prolifera [Cu(II)] (7), azurin from Alcaligenes denitrificans [Cu(II) and Cu(D] (8, 9), azurin from Pseudomonas aeruginosa [Cu(II)] (10, 11), as well as pseudoazurin from Alcaligenes faecalis S-6 (12), and the cucumber basic protein, both in the Cu(II) state, have been published (13), making this one of the best-documented class of proteins. In addition, information as to three-dimensional structure in solution has been obtained from two-dimensional NMR studies on French bean and Scenedesmus obliquus plastocyanins (14,15). This review is concerned in the main with the active site chemistry. Other recent reviews are listed (16-20). 

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