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Query: UNIPROT:Q86TM3 (cage)
 29,987 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

The aim of this study was to create and characterize constitutively active mutant (CAM) histamine H(1) receptors (H(1)R) using random mutagenesis methods to further investigate the activation process of the rhodopsin-like family of G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs). This approach identified position 6.40 in TM 6 as a "hot spot" because mutation of Ile6.40(420) either to Glu, Gly, Ala, Arg, Lys, or Ser resulted in highly active CAM H(1)Rs, for which almost no histamine-induced receptor activation response could be detected. The highly conserved hydrophobic amino acid at position 6.40 defines, in a computational model of the H(1)R, the asparagine cage motif that restrains the side chain of Asn7.49 of the NPxxY motif toward transmembrane domain (TM 6) in the inactive state of the receptor. Mutation of the asparagine cage into Ala or Gly, removing the interfering bulky constraints, increases the constitutive activity of the receptor. The fact that the Ile6.40(420)Arg/Lys/Glu mutant receptors are highly active CAM H(1)Rs leads us to suggest that a positively charged residue, presumably the highly conserved Arg3.50 from the DRY motif, interacts in a direct or an indirect (through other side chains or/and internal water molecules) manner with the acidic Asp2.50..Asn7.49 pair for receptor activation.
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PMID:Constitutively active mutants of the histamine H1 receptor suggest a conserved hydrophobic asparagine-cage that constrains the activation of class A G protein-coupled receptors. 1795 10

Prevotella intermedia is a major periodontopathogen contributing to human gingivitis and periodontitis. Such pathogens release proteases as virulence factors that cause deterrence of host defenses and tissue destruction. A new cysteine protease from the cysteine-histidine-dyad class, interpain A, was studied in its zymogenic and self-processed mature forms. The latter consists of a bivalved moiety made up by two subdomains. In the structure of a catalytic cysteine-to-alanine zymogen variant, the right subdomain interacts with an unusual prodomain, thus contributing to latency. Unlike the catalytic cysteine residue, already in its competent conformation in the zymogen, the catalytic histidine is swung out from its active conformation and trapped in a cage shaped by a backing helix, a zymogenic hairpin, and a latency flap in the zymogen. Dramatic rearrangement of up to 20A of these elements triggered by a tryptophan switch occurs during activation and accounts for a new activation mechanism for proteolytic enzymes. These findings can be extrapolated to related potentially pathogenic cysteine proteases such as Streprococcus pyogenes SpeB and Porphyromonas gingivalis periodontain.
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PMID:A new autocatalytic activation mechanism for cysteine proteases revealed by Prevotella intermedia interpain A. 1799 55

To determine ancestral allele in possible cancer-associated polymorphisms, DNA samples from 10 chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) were sequenced for alleles corresponding to 17 polymorphisms: 8 short tandem repeats [IL1RN (alias IL-1RA) variable number tandem repeat (VNTR); TYMS (previously TS) VNTR; AR CAG repeat; dinucleotide repeats of UGT1A1, IGF1, IFNG (alias IFN-gamma), ESR1 (alias ER-alpha), and EGFR] and 9 single nucleotide polymorphisms (MMP1-1607 1G/2G, MMP3-1171 5A/6A, OGG1 Ser326Cys, ALDH2 Gly487Lys, TP53 Arg72Pro, ABCG2 Gln141Lys, MGMT Leu84Phe, SOD2 Ala-9Val, and MTHFR Ala222Val). No chimpanzee polymorphism corresponded to human IL1RN VNTR; the ancestral allele was a repeat lost in humans. Dinucleotide repeat polymorphisms of IGF1, IFNG, ESR1, and EGFR were shared by chimpanzees, but the length of repeats tended to be longer in humans than in chimpanzees. This tendency was particularly evident for IGF1. All of the SNPs tested are human-specific nucleotide changes. The ancestral allele 7A was shown to be lost in MMP3-1171 5A/6A. Thus, all of the possible cancer-associated polymorphisms tested have human-specific alleles, and the ancestral allele is lost in three polymorphisms (IL1RN VNTR, UGT1A1 CA repeat, and MMP3-1171 5A/6A), suggesting a possible involvement of human-specific alleles in cancer susceptibility.
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PMID:Determination of ancestral allele for possible human cancer-associated polymorphisms. 1806 29

The Trp-cage, as the smallest miniprotein, remains the subject of numerous computational and experimental studies of protein folding dynamics and pathways. The original Trp-cage (NLYIQWLKDGGPSSGRPPPS, Tm = 42 degrees C) can be significantly stabilized by mutations; melting points as high as 64 degrees C are reported. In helical portions of the structure, each allowed replacement of Leu, Ile, Lys or Ser residues by Ala results in a 1.5 (+/-0.35) kJ/mol fold stabilization. No changes in structure or fluxionality of the core results upon stabilization. Contrary to the initial hypothesis, specific Pro/Trp interactions are not essential for core formation. The entropic advantage of Pro versus Ala (DeltaDeltaS(U) = 11 +/- 2 J/mol K) was measured at the solvent-exposed P17 site. Pro-Ala mutations at two of the three prolines (P12 and P18) that encage the indole ring result in less fold destabilization (2.3-3.4 kJ/mol). However, a P19A mutation reduces fold stability by 16 kJ/mol reflecting a favorable Y3/P19 interaction as well as Trp burial. The Y3/P19 hydrophobic staple interaction defines the folding motif as an 18-residue unit. Other stabilizing features that have been identified include a solvent-exposed Arg/Asp salt bridge (3.4-6 kJ/mol) and a buried H-bonded Ser side chain ( approximately 10 kJ/mol).
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PMID:The Trp-cage: optimizing the stability of a globular miniprotein. 1820 2

The synthesis and X-ray structure of two diasteriomeric heptapeptides [Ac-Ala-Ala-Ala-(R/S)-Cage-Ala-Ala-Ala-NH2] with a trishomocubane amino acid as a beta-turn scaffold are reported. The amino acid was synthesized as a racemate and two diastereomeric peptides were obtained. The two peptides were separated by preparative high-pressure liquid chromatography and crystals suitable for X-ray analysis were grown for both diasteriomeric peptides. In general, both the peptides satisfy the criteria for beta-turn conformations. Five of the six Ala residues of both cage peptide crystals satisfy the criteria for 3(10)-helix characteristics and the cage amino acid residue satisfied the alpha-helix classification. These experimental results confirm previous theoretical studies in our laboratory which predicted that the cage moiety would be a strong/active beta-turn inducer.
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PMID:Trishomocubane amino acid as a beta-turn scaffold. 1820 26

Drosophila melanogaster MTF-1 (dMTF-1) is a copper-responsive transcriptional activator that mediates resistance to Cu, as well as Zn and Cd. Here, we characterize a novel cysteine-rich domain which is crucial for sensing excess intracellular copper by dMTF-1. Transgenic flies expressing mutant dMTF-1 containing alanine substitutions of two, four or six cysteine residues within the sequence (547)CNCTNCKCDQTKSCHGGDC(565) are significantly or completely impaired in their ability to protect flies from copper toxicity and fail to up-regulate MtnA (metallothionein) expression in response to excess Cu. In contrast, these flies exhibit wild-type survival in response to copper deprivation thus revealing that the cysteine cluster domain is required only for sensing Cu load by dMTF-1. Parallel studies show that the isolated cysteine cluster domain is required to protect a copper-sensitive S. cerevisiae ace1Delta strain from copper toxicity. Cu(I) ligation by a Cys-rich domain peptide fragment drives the cooperative assembly of a polydentate [Cu(4)-S(6)] cage structure, characterized by a core of trigonally S(3) coordinated Cu(I) ions bound by bridging thiolate ligands. While reminiscent of Cu(4)-L(6) (L = ligand) tetranuclear clusters in copper regulatory transcription factors of yeast, the absence of significant sequence homology is consistent with convergent evolution of a sensing strategy particularly well suited for Cu(I).
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PMID:Copper sensing function of Drosophila metal-responsive transcription factor-1 is mediated by a tetranuclear Cu(I) cluster. 1841 Dec 9

The folding enantioselectivity for D-Ala versus L-Ala at one glycine site in the Trp-cage is 16 kJ mol(-1); judicious introductions of alanines of the correct chirality raises the melting temperature of this 20-residue fold to 83 degrees C.
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PMID:Hyperstable miniproteins: additive effects of D- and L-Ala mutations. 1900 84

Current approaches aimed at determining the free energy surface of all-atom medium-size proteins in explicit solvent are slow and are not sufficient to converge to equilibrium properties. To ensure a proper sampling of the configurational space, it is preferable to use reduced representations such as implicit solvent and/or coarse-grained protein models, which are much lighter computationally. Each model must be verified, however, to ensure that it can recover experimental structures and thermodynamics. Here we test the coarse-grained implicit solvent OPEP model with replica exchange molecular dynamics (REMD) on six peptides ranging in length from 10 to 28 residues: two alanine-based peptides, the second beta-hairpin from protein G, the Trp-cage and zinc-finger motif, and a dimer of a coiled coil peptide. We show that REMD-OPEP recovers the proper thermodynamics of the systems studied, with accurate structural description of the beta-hairpin and Trp-cage peptides (within 1-2 A from experiments). The light computational burden of REMD-OPEP, which enables us to generate many hundred nanoseconds at each temperature and fully assess convergence to equilibrium ensemble, opens the door to the determination of the free energy surface of larger proteins and assemblies.
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PMID:Replica exchange molecular dynamics simulations of coarse-grained proteins in implicit solvent. 1906 49

The fundamental process of protein self-assembly is governed by protein-protein interactions between subunits, which combine to form structures that are often on the nano-scale. The nano-cage protein, bacterioferritin from Escherichia coli, a maxi-ferritin made up of 24 subunits, was chosen as the basis for an alanine-shaving mutagenesis study to discover key amino acid residues at symmetry-related protein-protein interfaces that control protein stability and self-assembly. By inspection of these interfaces and "virtual alanine scanning," nine mutants were designed, expressed, purified, and characterized using transmission electron microscopy, size exclusion chromatography, dynamic light scattering, native PAGE, and temperature-dependent CD. Many of the selected amino acids act as hot spot residues. Four of these (Arg-30, which is located at the two-fold axis, and Arg-61, Tyr-114, and Glu-128, which are located at the three-fold axis), when individually mutated to alanine, completely shut down detectable solution formation of 24-mer, favoring a cooperatively folded dimer, suggesting that they may be oligomerization "switch residues." Furthermore, two residues, Arg-30 and Arg-61, when changed to alanine form mutants that are more thermodynamically stable than the native protein. This investigation into the structure and energetics of this self-assembling nano-cage protein not only can act as a jumping off point for the eventual design of novel protein nano-structures but can also help to understand the role that structure plays on the function of this important class of proteins.
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PMID:Alanine-shaving mutagenesis to determine key interfacial residues governing the assembly of a nano-cage maxi-ferritin. 2013 6

We analyzed the accuracy of the fragment molecular orbital method using various representations of the embedding potential and extended its applicability to large basis sets by proposing to use potential-derived point charges with screening combined with the adaptive frozen orbital treatment of the detached bonds. A comprehensive set of basis sets: STO-3G, 6-31G*, 6-311G*, 6-31++G**, 6-311++G**, cc-pVDZ, cc-pVTZ, aug-cc-pVDZ, and aug-cc-pVTZ was employed; for tests systems we used water clusters with 16 and 32 molecules, the alpha-helices and beta-strands of alanine containing 10 and 20 residues, as well as chignolin (PDB: 1UAO ) and Trp-cage miniprotein (PDB: 1L2Y ).
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PMID:Systematic study of the embedding potential description in the fragment molecular orbital method. 2044 Dec 28


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