Sequence conservation

An effective method for localizing causes of redox potentials is to plot the total backbone and side chain contributions to ( ) per residue for homologous proteins as functions of the residue number using a consensus sequence, with insertions treated by summing the contribution of the entire insertion as one residue. The results for homologous proteins should be examined for differences in the contributions to ( ) per residue that correlate with observed redox potential differences. These differences can then be correlated with any other sequence-redox potential data for proteins that lack crystal or NMR structures. In addition, any sequences of homologous proteins that lack both redox potentials and structures should be examined, because residues important in defining the redox potential are likely to have semi-sequence conservation of a few key amino acid types. 

Comparison of the amino acid sequences of the L and M subunits of the reaction centers from three different bacterial species shows that about 50% of all residues in those two subunits are conserved in all three species. In the transmembrane helices, sequence conservation varies. Residues that are buried and have contacts either with pigments or with other transmembrane helices are about 60% conserved. In contrast, residues that are fully exposed to the membrane lipids are only 16% conserved. Clearly, fewer restrictions... 

Five of the six loop regions (G1-G5 in Figure 13.4) that are present at the carboxy end of the p sheet in the Ras structure participate in the GTP binding site. Three of these loops, G1 (residues 10-17), G3 (57-60), and G4 (116-119), contain regions of amino acid sequence conserved among small GTP-binding proteins and the Ga subunits of trimerlc G proteins. 

Sequence conservation is, in general, much weaker than structural conservation. There are proteins, which are clearly not related in sequence but are closely related in 3D-stmcture and fold, like heamoglobin and myoglobin, which have similar functions. In many proteins, fold elements like 4-helical bundles are repeated. Classifications of known structural folds of proteins are organized in the SCOP or CATH database see e.g., http //scop.mrc-lmb.cam.ac.uk/scop/. 

Substances that do not target the active site but display inhibition by allosteric mechanisms are associated with a lower risk of unwanted interference with related cellular enzymes. Allosteric inhibition of the viral polymerase is employed in the case of HIV-1 nonnucleosidic RT inhibitors (NNRTl, see chapter by Zimmermann et al., this volume) bind outside the RT active site and act by blocking a conformational change of the enzyme essential for catalysis. A potential disadvantage of targeting regions distant from the active site is that these may be subject to a lower selective pressure for sequence conservation than the active site itself, which can lower the threshold for escape of the virus by mutation. 

Toumier-Lasserve, E, Odenwald, W. F Garbem, J., Trojanowski, J., and Lazzarini, R. A. (1989). Remarkable intron and exon sequence conservation in human and mouse homeobox 1.3 genes. Mol. Cell Biol. 9 2273-2278. 

FIGURE 50-3 Amino acid sequence conservation across mammalian odorant receptors. ORs pass through the plasma membrane (blue box) seven times, with the AT-terminus located extracellularly and the C-terminus intracellularly. The degree of conservation of each amino acid in this consensus OR is indicated by a colored ball, with dark blue being most highly conserved and red most highly variable. Modified from [5], with permission. 

Figure 12.5 A. Comparison of the CHS monomer (left) and P-ketoacyl synthase monomer (right). The structurally conserved secondary structure of each monomer s upper domain is colored in blue (a-helix) and gold (P-strand). Portions of each protein monomer forming the dimer interface are colored purple. The side-chains of the catalytic residues of CHS (Cysl64, His303, Asn336) and P-ketoacyl synthase (Cysl63, His303, His340) are shown. B. Sequence conservation of the catalytic residues of CHS, 2-PS, p-ketoacyl synthase (FAS II), and the ketosynthase modules of 6-deoxyerythronolide B synthase (DEBS), actinorhodin synthase (ActI) and tetracenomycin synthase (TcmK). The catalytic residues are in red.

A central element in the prediction of secondary structure is the periodicity of sequence conservation, which has proven to be a good indicator in a number of membrane proteins (5). The periodicity is quantified by Fourier transform (FT) analysis. A... 

Structural biology provides a final way to define an E2 enzyme. As expected from the strong sequence conservation, the E2 core domain adopts a conserved fold. At the time this article was being prepared, twelve different E2 structures had been deposited in the Protein Data Bank. The average root-mean-square deviation of... 

The sequence conservation is reflected in a highly conserved secondary and tertiary structure that is most clearly illustrated in the three-dimensional superposition of C atoms. Ignoring the C-terminal domains of PVC and HPII, the deviation of C atoms in a superposition of HPII with PVC, BLC, PMC, and MLC results in root mean square deviations of 1.1,1.5,1.6, and 1.5 A for 525, 477, 471, and 465 eqiuvalent centers, respectively (83). In other words, there is very little difference in the tertiary structure of the subunits over almost the complete length of the protein. The large and small subunits are shown in Fig. 8 for comparison. 

Structure of a HAT from the p300/CBP family has been long awaited, since these enzymes have no sequence similarity with enzymes of the GNAT and MYST families. The structure of the p300 HAT domain was solved very recently in complex with a Lys-GoA bi-substrate inhibitor, which required a highly intricate expression and purification protocol in order to produce a protein amenable to crystallization studies [24]. Analysis of the structure revealed however that, despite no sequence conservation, a similar structural core is observed as for the GNAT and MYST... 

---