Expression and purification of single cysteine-containing mutant variants of the mouse prion protein by oxidative refolding.

The folding and aggregation of proteins has been studied extensively, using multiple probes. To facilitate such experiments, introduction of spectroscopically-active moieties in to the protein of interest is often necessary. This is commonly achieved by specifically labelling cysteine residues in the protein, which are either present naturally or introduced artificially by site-directed mutagenesis. In the case of the recombinant prion protein, which is normally expressed in inclusion bodies, the presence of the native disulfide bond complicates the correct refolding of single cysteine-containing mutant variants of the protein. To overcome this major bottleneck, a simple purification strategy for single tryptophan, single cysteine-containing mutant variants of the mouse prion protein is presented, with yields comparable to that of the wild type protein. The protein(s) obtained by this method are correctly folded, with a single reduced cysteine, and the native disulfide bond between residues C178 and C213 intact. The ß-sheet rich oligomers formed from these mutant variant protein(s) are identical to the wild type protein oligomer. The current strategy facilitates sample preparation for a number of high resolution spectroscopic measurements for the prion protein, which specifically require thiol labelling.

Cysteine-specific Cu2+ chelating tags used as paramagnetic probes in double electron electron resonance.

Double electron electron resonance (DEER) is an attractive technique that is utilized for gaining insight into protein structure and dynamics via nanometer-scale distance measurements. The most commonly used paramagnetic tag in these measurements is a nitroxide spin label, R1. Here, we present the application of two types of high-affinity Cu(2+) chelating tags, based on the EDTA and cyclen metal-binding motifs as alternative X-band DEER probes, using the B1 immunoglobulin-binding domain of protein G (GB1) as a model system. Both types of tags have been incorporated into a variety of protein secondary structure environments and exhibit high spectral sensitivity. In particular, the cyclen-based tag displays distance distributions with comparable distribution widths and most probable distances within 1-3 Å when compared to homologous R1 distributions. The results display the viability of the cyclen tag as an alternative to the R1 side chain for X-band DEER distance measurements in proteins.

Protein fold determined by paramagnetic magic-angle spinning solid-state NMR spectroscopy.

Biomacromolecules that are challenging for the usual structural techniques can be studied with atomic resolution by solid-state NMR spectroscopy. However, the paucity of distance restraints >5 Å, traditionally derived from measurements of magnetic dipole-dipole couplings between protein nuclei, is a major bottleneck that hampers such structure elucidation efforts. Here, we describe a general approach that enables the rapid determination of global protein fold in the solid phase via measurements of nuclear paramagnetic relaxation enhancements (PREs) in several analogues of the protein of interest containing covalently attached paramagnetic tags, without the use of conventional internuclear distance restraints. The method is demonstrated using six cysteine-EDTA-Cu(2+) mutants of the 56-residue B1 immunoglobulin-binding domain of protein G, for which ~230 longitudinal backbone (15)N PREs corresponding to distances of ~10-20 Å were obtained. The mean protein fold determined in this manner agrees with the X-ray structure with a backbone atom root-mean-square deviation of 1.8 Å.