Biomedical subjects

J Raúl Grigera

Publications and source records attributed to J Raúl Grigera.

6 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed2005

Pressure denaturation of apomyoglobin: a molecular dynamics simulation study.

The effect of pressure on the structure and mobility of Sperm Wale Apomyoglobin was studied by Molecular Dynamics computer simulation at 1 bar and 3 kbar (1 atm=1.01325 bar=101.325 kPa). The results are in good agreement with the available experimental data, allowing further analysis of other features of the effect of pressure on the protein solution. From the analysis of Secondary Structures (SS) along the trajectories it is observed that alpha-helixes are favoured under pressure at the expense of bends, turns and 3-helixes. The studies of mobility show that although the general mobility is restricted under pressure this is not true for some particular residues. The studies of tertiary structure show important conformational changes. The evolution of the Solvent Accessed Surface (SAS) with pressure shows a notorious increase due almost completely to a biased raise in the hydrophobic area exposed, which consequently shows that the hydrophobic interaction is considerably weaker under high hydrostatic pressure conditions.

Animals↗

PubMed2005

Effect of pressure on the conformation of proteins. A molecular dynamics simulation of lysozyme.

The effect of pressure on the structure and mobility of lysozyme was studied by molecular dynamics computer simulation at 1 and 3 kbar (1 atm = 1.01325 bar = 101.325 kPa). The results have good agreement with the available experimental data, allowing the analysis of other features of the effect of pressure on the protein solution. The studies of mobility show that although the general mobility is restricted under pressure this is not true for some particular residues. From the analysis of secondary structure along the trajectories it is observed that the conformation under pressure is more stable, suggesting that pressure acts as a 'conformer selector' on the protein. The difference in solvent-accessed surface (SAS) with pressure shows a clear inversion of the hydrophilic/hydrophobic SAS ratio, which consequently shows that the hydrophobic interaction is considerably weaker under high hydrostatic pressure conditions.

Carbon↗

PubMed2005

Free energy perturbation calculations on glucosidase-inhibitor complexes.

Free energy perturbation studies have been performed on Glucoamylase II (471) from Aspergillus awamori var. X100 complexed with three different inhibitors: (+)lentiginosine, (+)(1S,2S,7R,8aS) 1,2,7-trihydroxyindolizidine, (+)(1S,2S,7S,8aS) 1,2,7-trihydroxyindolizidine and the inactive compound (+)(1S,7R,8aS)-1,7-dihydroxyindolizidine. Molecular dynamic simulations were carried out using a recently developed procedure for fast Free Energy Perturbation calculations. In this procedure only a sphere of 1.8 nm around the central atom of the inhibitor is considered in the calculations. Crystallographic restraints are applied over this reduced system using a generated electron density map. The obtained values for the free energy differences agree with experimental data showing the importance of fast calculations in drug design even when the crystallographic structure of the complex is not available. As the method uses only the crystallographic structure of the receptor, it is possible to test the possible efficiency of even still not synthesised ligands, making the pre-selection of compounds much easy and faster.

Alkaloids↗

PubMed2003

The role of hydration on the mechanism of allosteric regulation: in situ measurements of the oxygen-linked kinetics of water binding to hemoglobin.

We report here the first direct measurements of changes in protein hydration triggered by a functional binding. This task is achieved by weighing hemoglobin (Hb) and myoglobin films exposed to an atmosphere of 98% relative humidity during oxygenation. The binding of the first oxygen molecules to Hb tetramer triggers a change in protein conformation, which increases binding affinity to the remaining empty sites giving rise to the appearance of cooperative phenomena. Although crystallographic data have evidenced that this structural change increases the protein water-accessible surface area, isobaric osmotic stress experiments in aqueous cosolutions have shown that water binding is linked to Hb oxygenation. Now we show that the differential hydration between fully oxygenated and fully deoxygenated states of these proteins, determined by weighing protein films with a quartz crystal microbalance, agree with the ones determined by osmotic stress in aqueous cosolutions, from the linkage between protein oxygen affinity and water activity. The agreements prove that the changes in water activity brought about by adding osmolytes to the buffer solution shift biochemical equilibrium in proportion to the number of water molecules associated with the reaction. The concomitant kinetics of oxygen and of water binding to Hb have been also determined. The data show that the binding of water molecules to the extra protein surface exposed on the transition from the low-affinity T to the high-affinity R conformations of hemoglobin is the rate-limiting step of Hb cooperative reaction. This evidences that water binding is a crucial step on the allosteric mechanism regulating cooperative interactions, and suggests the possibility that environmental water activity might be engaged in the kinetic control of some important reactions in vivo.

Allosteric Regulation↗

PubMed2002

Stochastic molecular dynamics of peanut lectin PNA complex with T-antigen disaccharide.

The stochastic boundary molecular dynamics simulation method was applied to investigate the structure of a complex comprised of a tetrameric peanut lectin and the tumour-associated disaccharide, Galbeta1-3GalNAc (T-antigen). Only a small region encompassing the active site was explicitly included in the calculations, but the electrical contribution of most outer atoms was taken into account by adding to the effective potential a term coming from an electrostatic potential grid that was pre-calculated and used to approximate the electrostatic energy and the force at any point in the interacting site. Results of simulating the intermolecular hydrogen bond network agree fairly well with X-ray experiments. An estimation of the direct and water-mediated interaction mean lifetimes and mean water residence times around the T-antigen oxygen atoms was computed over 400 ps. Monitoring the behaviour of water molecules within the active site revealed that there is a constant exchange of water with the bulk, especially in the proximity of ASN41, ASN127 and GLU129. The temporal evolution of the glycosidic linkage was also investigated and compared with simulations of T-antigen in solution. These studies of peanut lectins-sugar complexes clearly emphasize the importance of bound water molecules in generating carbohydrate specificity.

Antigens, Tumor-Associated, Carbohydrate↗

PubMed2002

Collagen stability, hydration and native state.

Molecular dynamics simulations of a collagen-like peptide (Pro-Hyp-Gly)4-Pro-Hyp-Ala-(Pro-Hyp-Gly)5 have been done in order to study the contribution of the hydration structure on keeping the native structure of collagen. The simulation shows that the absence of water produces a distortion on the molecular conformation and an increase in the number of intra-molecular hydrogen bonds. This is in agreement with previous experimental results showing the stiffness of collagen under severe drying and its increase in the thermal stability. This dehydrated material does not keep, however, the native structure.

Amino Acids↗