An E1-Catalyzed Chemoenzymatic Strategy to Isopeptide-N-Ethylated Deubiquitylase-Resistant Ubiquitin Probes.

Triazole-based deubiquitylase (DUB)-resistant ubiquitin (Ub) probes have recently emerged as effective tools for the discovery of Ub chain-specific interactors in proteomic studies, but their structural diversity is limited. A new family of DUB-resistant Ub probes is reported based on isopeptide-N-ethylated dimeric or polymeric Ub chains, which can be efficiently prepared by a one-pot, ubiquitin-activating enzyme (E1)-catalyzed condensation reaction of recombinant Ub precursors to give various homotypic and even branched Ub probes at multi-milligram scale. Proteomic studies using label-free quantitative (LFQ) MS indicated that the isopeptide-N-ethylated Ub probes may complement the triazole-based probes in the study of Ub interactome. Our study highlights the utility of modern protein synthetic chemistry to develop structurally and new families of tool molecules needed for proteomic studies.

Acyl donors for native chemical ligation.

Native chemical ligation (NCL) has become one of the most important methods in chemical syntheses of proteins. Recently, in order to expand its scope, considerable effort has been devoted to tuning the C-terminal acyl donor thioesters used in NCL. This article reviews the recent advances in the design of C-terminal acyl donors, their precursors and surrogates, and highlights some noteworthy progress that may lead the future direction of protein chemical synthesis.

Recent advances in racemic protein crystallography.

Solution of the three-dimensional structures of proteins is a critical step in deciphering the molecular mechanisms of their bioactivities. Among the many approaches for obtaining protein crystals, racemic protein crystallography has been developed as a unique method to solve the structures of an increasing number of proteins. Exploiting unnatural protein enantiomers in crystallization and resolution, racemic protein crystallography manifests two major advantages that are 1) to increase the success rate of protein crystallization, and 2) to obviate the phase problem in X-ray diffraction. The requirement of unnatural protein enantiomers in racemic protein crystallography necessitates chemical protein synthesis, which is hitherto accomplished through solid phase peptide synthesis and chemical ligation reactions. This review highlights the fundamental ideas of racemic protein crystallography and surveys the harvests in the field of racemic protein crystallography over the last five years from early 2012 to late 2016.