Biomedical subjects

O Carugo

Publications and source records attributed to O Carugo.

14 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed2001

Detection of breaking points in helices linking separate domains.

A novel method is proposed to predict whether two domains connected by a helical link can mutually reorient themselves, as well as where the helix can be distorted to allow the domain-domain movements. The method, based on analysis of the variation of the a.d.p. values along the helix link, is applied to three proteins--calmodulin, lysozyme, and hemagglutinin--for which both the domain-domain flexibility and the helix fragment responsible for it are well documented. The helix regions that are variously distorted to permit domain-domain reorientation are well predicted. The method is also applied to colicin Ia and shows that an inter-domain rearrangement can take place as previously postulated. The prediction of the helix breaking point should prove useful in interpreting structural data and in defining the domain borders automatically for proteins built by domains connected by helical links.

Calmodulin↗

PubMed2001

Structural analysis of free and enzyme-bound amaranth alpha-amylase inhibitor: classification within the knottin fold superfamily and analysis of its functional flexibility.

The three-dimensional structure of the amaranth alpha-amylase inhibitor (AAI) adopts a knottin fold of abcabc topology. Upon binding to alpha-amylase, it adopts a more compact conformation characterized by an increased number of intramolecular hydrogen bonds, a decreased volume and in addition a trans to cis isomerization of Pro20. A systematic analysis of the 3-D structural databanks revealed that similar proteins and domains share with AAI the characteristic presence of proline residues, many of which are in a cis backbone conformation. As these proteins fulfil a variety of functional roles and are expressed in very different organisms, we conclude that the structure of the knottin fold, including the propensity of the cis bond, are the result of convergent evolution.

Algorithms↗

PubMed2001

A normalized root-mean-square distance for comparing protein three-dimensional structures.

The degree of similarity of two protein three-dimensional structures is usually measured with the root-mean-square distance between equivalent atom pairs. Such a similarity measure depends on the dimension of the proteins, that is, on the number of equivalent atom pairs. The present communication presents a simple procedure to make the root-mean-square distances between pairs of three-dimensional structures independent of their dimensions. This normalization may be useful in evolutionary and fold classification studies as well as in simple comparisons between different structural models.

Algorithms↗

PubMed2000

Predicting residue solvent accessibility from protein sequence by considering the sequence environment.

The solvent accessibility of each residue is predicted on the basis of the protein sequence. A set of 338 monomeric, non-homologous and high-resolution protein crystal structures is used as a learning set and a jackknife procedure is applied to each entry. The prediction is based on the comparison of the observed and the average values of the solvent-accessible area. It appears that the prediction accuracy is significantly improved by considering the residue types preceding and/or following the residue whose accessibility must be predicted. In contrast, the separate treatment of different secondary structural types does not improve the quality of the prediction. It is furthermore shown that the residue accessibility is much better predicted in small than in larger proteins. Such a discrepancy must be carefully considered in any algorithm for predicting residue accessibility.

Amino Acid Sequence↗

PubMed1999

Correlation between occupancy and B factor of water molecules in protein crystal structures.

An empirical relationship between occupancy and the atomic displacement parameter of water molecules in protein crystal structures has been found by comparing a set of well refined sperm whale myoglobin crystal structures. The relationship agrees with a series of independent structural features whose impact on water occupancy can easily be predicted as well as with other known data and is independent of the protein fold. The estimation of the water occupancy in protein crystal structures may help in understanding the physico-chemical properties of the protein-solvent interface and can allow the monitoring of the accuracy of the protein crystal structure refinement.

Animals↗

PubMed1999

Reliability of atomic displacement parameters in protein crystal structures.

Mean standard errors in atomic displacement parameters (ADPs) resulting from protein crystal structure determinations are estimated by comparing the ADPs of protein-chain pairs of identical sequence within the same crystal or within different crystals displaying the same or different space groups. The estimated ADP standard errors increase nearly linearly as the resolution decreases - an unexpected result given the nonlinear dependence of the resolution on the amount of diffraction data. The estimated ADP standard errors are larger for side-chain and solvent-exposed atoms than for main-chain and buried atoms and, surprisingly, are also larger for residues in the helical secondary structure relative to other local backbone conformations. The results allow an estimate of the influence of crystallographic refinement restraints on ADP standard errors. Such corrections should be applied when comparing different protein structures.

Crystallography, X-Ray↗

PubMed1999

How many water molecules can be detected by protein crystallography?

The number of water molecules which are expected to be experimentally located by protein crystallography was determined by multiple regression analysis on a test set of 873 known protein crystal structures determined at room temperature and on another set of 33 structures determined at low temperature. The dependence of the number of water molecules included in the protein models as a function of a number of significant regressors, such as resolution, fraction of crystal volume occupied by the solvent, number of residues in the asymmetric unit, fraction of apolar protein surface or secondary structure, has been studied. The number of water molecules included in crystallographic models depends primarily on the resolution at which the structure has been solved, while the temperature of the data collection has only marginal influence. On average, at 2.0 A resolution one water molecule per residue is included in the model, while at 1.0 A resolution about 1.6-1.7 are crystallographically located. At 2.0 A resolution the well known rule-of-thumb of 'one water per protein residue' is confirmed, though the number of water molecules experimentally observed is strongly dependent on resolution. The results presented are useful in assessing the quality of a protein crystal structure, in selecting structural results to be compared and in evaluating the expected improvement on the solvent structure when increasing the crystallographic resolution.

Crystallography, X-Ray↗

PubMed1999

Stereochemistry of the interaction between methionine sulfur and the protein core.

The stereochemical features of the interaction between the sulfur atom of methionine residues and surrounding atoms are examined on a large set of known protein crystal structures. It appears that the minimum energy conformations observed in small molecule crystals are not observed within the protein core. This suggests that these interactions are either of little intensity, though they might contribute to regulate the protein physiological behavior, or physicochemically different from their counterpart in small molecule crystals.

Databases, Factual↗

PubMed1998

Accessibility to internal cavities and ligand binding sites monitored by protein crystallographic thermal factors.

Protein structures are flexible both in solution and in the solid state. X-ray crystallographically determined thermal factors monitor the flexibility of protein atoms. A method utilizing such factors is proposed to delineate protein regions through which a ligand can exchange between binding site and bulk solvent. It is based on the assumption that thermally excited protein regions are excellent candidates for opening a ligand channel. Computationally simple and inexpensive, the method analyzes directions from which thermal factors can propagate within the protein, resulting in thermal motion paths (TMPs). Applications to engineered T4 lysozymes, where an artificial internal cavity can host hydrophobic molecules, and to sperm whale myoglobins, where the active site is completely buried, yielded results in agreement with other independent structural observations and with previous hypotheses. Further new features could also be suggested. The proposed TMP analysis could aid molecular dynamics simulation studies as well as time-resolved and site-directed mutagenesis experimental studies, especially given its modest computational expense and its direct roots in experimental results based on thermal factors determined in high-resolution crystallographic studies.

Animals↗

PubMed1997

NADP-dependent enzymes. I: Conserved stereochemistry of cofactor binding.

The ubiquitous redox cofactors nicotinamide adenine dinucleotides [NAD and NADP] are very similar molecules, despite their participation in substantially different biochemical processes. NADP differs from NAD in only the presence of an additional phosphate group esterified to the 2'-hydroxyl group of the ribose at the adenine end and yet NADP is confined with few exceptions to the reactions of reductive biosynthesis, whereas NAD is used almost exclusively in oxidative degradations. The discrimination between NAD and NADP is therefore an impressive example of the power of molecular recognition by proteins. The many known tertiary structures of NADP complexes affords the possibility for an analysis of their discrimination. A systematic analysis of several crystal structures of NAD(P)-protein complexes show that: 1) the NADP coenzymes are more flexible in conformation than those of NAD; 2) although the protein-cofactor interactions are largely conserved in the NAD complexes, they are quite variable in those of NADP; and 3) in both cases the pocket around the nicotinamide moiety is substrate dependent. The conserved and variable interactions between protein and cofactors in the respective binding pockets are reported in detail. Discrimination between NAD and NADP is essentially a consequence of the overall pocket and not of a few residues. A clear fingerprint in NAD complexes is a carboxylate side chain that chelates the diol group at the ribose near the adenine, whereas in NADP complexes an arginine side chain faces the adenine plane and interacts with the phosphomonoester. The latter type of interaction might be a general feature of recognition of nucleotides by proteins. Other features such as strand-like hydrogen bonding between the NADP diphosphate moieties and the protein are also significant. The NADP binding pocket properties should prove useful in protein engineering and design.

Animals↗

PubMed1997

NADP-dependent enzymes. II: Evolution of the mono- and dinucleotide binding domains.

Nicotinamide adenine dinucleotides [NAD and NADP with both referred to as NAD(P)] are among the more diffuse redox cofactors. Despite their stereochemical similarity where the only difference is a phosphomonoester on the ribose near the adenine of NADP, they show different biochemical reactivities with NAD behaving as an oxidant and NADP as a reductant. NAD(P)-dependent enzymes generally share a common open alpha/beta fold with few exceptions only recently structurally characterized. This study of the molecular evolution of the NAD(P) binding domains, possible given the large number of known molecular structures, addresses two main questions: 1) can a common fold exist in different biological systems (divergent evolution) and 2) does a relationship exist among similar biological systems that display different folds (convergent evolution)? Both the structures of mono- and dinucleotide binding domains have been classified by cluster analysis based on the similarity evaluated by their main chain C alpha superposition. Moreover, the cofactor conformations and the stereochemical characteristics of their pockets have also been classified by analogous methods on the basis of the published tertiary structures. Two primary results appear: 1) the classification of the mononucleotide binding domains is different from that of the dinucleotide binding folds and 2) both divergent and convergent evolutionary pathways can be hypothesized, the latter less frequently observed and less pronounced but nevertheless evident. The generally accepted hypothesis that dinucleotide binding domains have evolved by gene duplication of primordial genes coding for the smaller mononucleotide binding domains is acceptable but the two halves of the resulting dinucleotide binding domains are evolutionarily uncorrelated. The NH2-terminal mononucleotide binding domain is less variable than the COOH-terminal half, probably because it involves the binding of the ADP moiety of NAD(P) invariant in all examined systems. There is evidence to postulate that evolutionary pathways for NAD(P)-dependent enzymes are both divergent and convergent. In fact, nearly all combinations of similarity dissimilarity in overall fold, cofactor conformation, and cofactor binding pocket structural characteristics for each enzyme pair examined are possible. The NAD(P)-dependent enzymes apparently provide a canonical example of an evolutionary principle that "anything goes."

Animals↗

PubMed1997

Protein-protein crystal-packing contacts.

Protein-protein contacts in monomeric protein crystal structures have been analyzed and compared to the physiological protein-protein contacts in oligomerization. A number of features differentiate the crystal-packing contacts from the natural contacts occurring in multimeric proteins. The area of the protein surface patches involved in packing contacts is generally smaller and its amino acid composition is indistinguishable from that of the protein surface accessible to the solvent. The fraction of protein surface in crystal contacts is very variable and independent of the number of packing contacts. The thermal motion at the crystal packing interface and that of the protein core, even for large packing interfaces, though the tendency is to be closer to that of the core. These results suggest that protein crystallization depends on random protein-protein interactions, which have little in common with physiological protein-protein recognition processes, and that the possibility of engineering macromolecular crystallization to improve crystal quality could be widened.

Crystallization↗

PubMed1997

Correlation between side chain mobility and conformation in protein structures.

Thermal factors of protein atoms as determined by X-ray crystallographic techniques show a tendency to be larger in side chains with unfavourable local conformations rather than in those displaying conformational energy minima. It follows that side chain atoms are more mobile if they are in a non-rotameric configuration and that the stereochemistry of protein structures cannot be fully assessed or simulated without consideration of thermal factors that monitor flexibility in various regions of the protein. The observations should also prove useful in protein folding and design.

Amino Acids↗

PubMed1995

Metal complexes of the carbonic anhydrase inhibitor methazolamide (Hmacm). Crystal structure of the Zn(macm)2(NH3)2. Anticonvulsant properties of the Cu(macm)2(NH3)3(H2O).

Complexes of Co(II), Cu(II), and Zn(II) with deprotonated methazolamide and ammonia are synthesized and characterized. The complex Zn(macm)2(NH3)2 crystallizes in the monoclinic C2/c space group with a = 13.468(1), b = 6.759(1), c = 23.014(2) A, beta = 90.27(1), and Z = 4. The structure was refined to R = 0.049 (Rw = 0.053). The Zn(II) ion is coordinated to two deprotonated sulfonamido nitrogen atoms of the macm- ligand and two nitrogen atoms of the ammonia ligands in a distorted tetrahedron. The Zn(macm)2(NH3)2 complex is shown to be a simple model for the methazolamide inhibition of CA. EHMO calculations applied to fractional coordinates of the Zn(macm)2(NH3)2 complex indicate that the atomic orbitals of the Zn do not contribute to HOMO and LUMO of the complex. The characteristics of the Cu(macm)2(NH3)3(H2O) as an anticonvulsant agent are tested.

Animals↗