The N-terminal domain of MDM2 resembles calmodulin and its relatives.

It is shown here that the N-terminal domain of MDM2, which is not thought to bind calcium ions, otherwise bears a striking resemblance to a cluster of four EF-hand modules like those found in the calmodulin family. There are similarities in module arrangement, supersecondary structure and the main-chain to main-chain hydrogen-bonding pattern, especially in the vicinity of the short antiparallel beta-sheet, the two strands of which lie between the two E and F helices of tandem modules. Some conserved amino acid residues are identified that are associated with short side-chain to main-chain hydrogen-bonded motifs. Also, both types of domain bind a short, functionally important hydrophobic alpha-helix from another protein in a cavity between the two pairs of EF-hand, or EF-hand-like, modules.

Structural differences between valine-12 and aspartate-12 Ras proteins may modify carcinoma aggression.

Recent evidence associates the codon 12 valine-for-glycine (G12V) mutant Ki-Ras protein with higher stage and increased lethality of colorectal carcinomas, while the codon 12 aspartate-for-glycine (G12D) Ras mutation shows no such association. Several observations may be relevant to this phenomenon. First, GTPase activity of G12V Ras is one-quarter that of G12D Ras and one-tenth that of wild-type (WT) Ras. Second, binding of the GTP analogue GppNp to G12D Ras is 8-fold weaker than its binding to G12V or WT Ras and crystal structures indicate that electrostatic repulsion between the carboxylate group of the G12D Asp-12 side-chain and the gamma phosphate of the bound nucleotide may make GTP binding to G12D Ras weaker even than that of GppNp. It is proposed that this lowering of affinity for GTP allows G12D Ras an escape from the oncogenic GTP-bound state, whereas GTP tightly bound to G12V mutant Ras generates a more persistent, potentially oncogenic, signal. Structural comparisons also suggest that differences between the Switch I (effector) region of G12D and G12V Ras could modify interactions with downstream signalling molecules such as Raf-1, neurofibromin, and phosphatidylinositol 3-hydroxy-kinase. Other differences between the G12D and G12V mutant Ras proteins include a lower affinity of the GTPase activating protein GAP for G12V than for G12D or WT Ras; but, as both G12D and G12V Ras are refractory to GTPase activation by GAP binding, this may be less significant. These studies complement experimental data showing that such Ras mutations differ in their effects in vitro and in vivo and, with recent data indicating heterogeneity of ras mutation in colorectal carcinomas and other tumours, make it plausible that codon 12 Ras mutations differ in carcinogenic potential and prognostic significance.

A natural grouping of motifs with an aspartate or asparagine residue forming two hydrogen bonds to residues ahead in sequence: their occurrence at alpha-helical N termini and in other situations.

Examination of the ways side-chain carboxylate and amide groups in high-resolution protein crystal structures form hydrogen bonds with main-chain atoms reveals that the most common category is a two-hydrogen-bond four to five residue motif with an aspartate or asparagine (Asx) at the first residue, for which we propose the name Asx-motif. Similar motifs with glutamate or glutamine residues at that position are rare. Asx-motifs occur typically as (1) a common feature of the N termini of alpha-helices called the Asx N-cap motif; (2) an independent motif, usually a beta-turn with an appropriately hydrogen-bonded Asx as the first residue; and (3) a motif incorporated in a beta-bulge loop. Asx-motifs are common, there being just under two-and-a-half in an average-sized protein subunit; of these, about 55 % are Asx N-cap motifs. Because they occur often in many situations, it seems that these motifs have an inherent propensity to form on their own rather than just being a feature stabilised at the end of a helix. Asx-motifs also occur in functionally interesting situations in aspartyl proteases, citrate synthase, EF hands, haemoglobins, lipocalins, glutathione reductase and the alpha/beta hydrolases.

A recurring two-hydrogen-bond motif incorporating a serine or threonine residue is found both at alpha-helical N termini and in other situations.

Side-chain hydroxyl residues in protein crystal structures often form hydrogen bonds with main-chain atoms. The most common bond arrangement is a four to five residue motif in which a serine or threonine is the first residue forming two characteristic hydrogen bonds to residues ahead of it in sequence. We call them ST-motifs, by analogy with the term Asx-motif we suggested for the related motifs with aspartate and asparagine residues. ST-motifs are common, there being just under one and a half in a typical protein subunit. Asx-motifs are even more common, such that 9 % of the residues of an average protein consist of Asx or ST-motifs. Of the ST-motifs, three-quarters are at helical N termini, and the rest occur by themselves or in conjunction with beta-bulge loops. A third of all alpha-helices have either ST-motifs or Asx-motifs at their N termini. Previous work has emphasised the occurrence of the capping box at alpha-helical N termini, but the capping box occurs in only 5 % of alpha-helical N termini; also, we point out that it can be regarded as a subset of the ST-motif (or, occasionally, of the Asx-motif). By comparing related sequences, the rates which amino acid residues at the first position of ST or Asx-motifs interchange during evolution are examined. Serine <==> threonine, and aspartate <==> asparagine, interchange is rapid; inter-pair exchange is slower, but much faster than exchange with other amino acid residues. This is consistent with the general similarity of ST-motifs and Asx-motifs combined with some subtle structural differences between them that are described.

The partial charge of the nitrogen atom in peptide bonds.

A majority of the standard texts dealing with proteins portray the peptide link as a mixture of two resonance forms, in one of which the nitrogen atom has a positive charge. As a consequence, it is often believed that the nitrogen atom has a net positive charge. This is in apparent contradiction with the partial negative charge on the nitrogen that is used in force fields for molecular modeling. However, charges on resonance forms are best regarded as formal rather than actual charges and current evidence clearly favors a net negative charge for the nitrogen atom. In the course of the discussion, new ideas about the electronic structure of amides and the peptide bond are presented.

Coulombic interactions between partially charged main-chain atoms not hydrogen-bonded to each other influence the conformations of alpha-helices and antiparallel beta-sheet. A new method for analysing the forces between hydrogen bonding groups in proteins includes all the Coulombic interactions.

An angle named gamma has been employed to describe the geometry at a hydrogen bond between main-chain atoms of polypeptides. In antiparallel beta-sheet, gamma is normally positive, whereas, in parallel beta-sheet and alpha-helices, it is negative. Although intriguing, no particular explanation has been offered to explain this result. We provide evidence that, in each case, the angular preference maximises the favourable Coulombic interaction between the partial negative charge on the carbonyl oxygen atom and the partial positive charge on the carbonyl carbon atom adjacent to the NH group to which it is hydrogen-bonded. Analyses of helices and beta-sheets in native proteins using Lennard-Jones potentials suggest that these carbonyl-carbonyl interactions are significant components of the attractive forces holding main-chain CONH groups together and are even in some cases larger than the hydrogen bonds themselves. A novel technique for analysing the forces holding together hydrogen-bonding groups in proteins is presented. It can be regarded as a development of the Kabsch and Sander method of calculating the energy of hydrogen bonds between main-chain atoms. In their program, electrostatic interactions are calculated between appropriate pairs of atoms, i.e. NH binding to CO. Instead, in our method, the four N, H, C, and O atoms, in a peptide bond are taken as a unit and the interaction between two NHCO groups calculated. We also use a Lennard-Jones potential, rather than just measuring the Coulombic interaction. With this approach, account is taken of all types of interactions between partially charged atoms, not only the hydrogen bonds.

Coulombic attractions between partially charged main-chain atoms stabilise the right-handed twist found in most beta-strands.

The use of Lennard-Jones potentials gives rise to an expected energy distribution for main-chain polypeptide conformations in the Ramachandran plot that matches well the observed distribution of phi, psi values in high-resolution proteins. The position of the energy minimum in the beta-strand conformation region is situated where there is a substantial contribution from the electrostatic attraction between the partial charge of the carbonyl carbon atom of one amino acid residue and that of the carbonyl oxygen atom of an adjacent residue. This attraction gives rise to a preference for the right-twisted beta-strand conformation compared with the left-twisted conformation. The majority of beta-sheets are twisted, almost always in one direction. Looking along a single strand, the twist is to the right. This twist also helps provide a rationale for the characteristic topology of the strand-helix-strand unit often observed in alpha/beta proteins. The electrostatic explanation for the twist we propose has not, to our knowledge, been explicitly suggested previously. The factor that has been most widely proposed to explain the twist is steric hindrance involving side-chain atoms. We provide evidence that the electrostatic effect is of comparable significance. Right-twisted beta-strands are geometrically closely related to polyproline II helices and to collagen helices, both of which are left-handed. Short regions of polyproline II type helices, which are sometimes, but not always, rich in proline residues, are common at protein surfaces. We point out that these helices are stabilised by the same carbonyl-carbonyl interactions as in right-twisted beta-strands.

Homology at the amino acid level between plant phytochromes and a regulator of asexual sporulation in Emericella (= Aspergillus) nidulans.

Protein sequence comparison between the N-terminal regions of the BRLA (bristle A) protein of the ascomycete fungus Aspergillus nidulans and a number of plant phytochromes has demonstrated a moderate level of sequence similarity. The region of similarity corresponds to the phytochrome domains believed to be responsible for photoreception and which undergo light-induced conformational changes, although a putative chromophore-binding site is not evident. Over 22% of residues are conserved and 24% conservatively substituted between residues 1 and 272 of BRLA and the N-terminal domains of Type 1 phytochromes from dicotyledonous species. A lower level of similarity, but over the same region, is observed in comparison with a wider range of phytochromes. Given the known role of BRLA as a transcriptional activator involved in conidiation, and the red/far-red reversible photoregulation of this developmental process, the similarity with phytochromes may be significant.

Mix'n'Match: an improved multiple sequence alignment procedure for distantly related proteins using secondary structure predictions, designed to be independent of the choice of gap penalty and scoring matrix.

A new multiple sequence alignment procedure is presented. Several different multiple alignments are made using differing criteria. Having divided the sequences into strongly conserved regions (SCRs) and loosely conserved regions (LCRs), the 'best' alignment for each LCR is chosen, independently of the other LCRs, from a selection of possibilities in the multiple alignments. To help make this choice for each LCR, the secondary structure is predicted and shown alongside each different possible alignment. One advantage of this method over automatic, non-interactive methods, is that the final alignment is not dependent on the choice of a single set of scoring parameters. Another is that, by allowing interactive choice and by taking account of secondary structural information, the final alignment is based more on biological rather than mathematical factors. This method can produce better alignments than any of the initial automatic multiple alignment methods used.

Common ring motifs in proteins involving asparagine or glutamine amide groups hydrogen-bonded to main-chain atoms.

We report the frequent occurrence in proteins of motifs consisting of either 9-membered or 11-membered rings that involve the side-chain amide groups of asparagine and glutamine residues. The syn CO and NH groups of these amide groups are hydrogen-bonded to the main-chain NH and CO groups of other amino acid residues. The main-chain part of both the 9-membered and 11-membered rings has the conformation of a beta-strand. One such ring motifs occurs, on average, in half of all the proteins we examined. Similar conformations are found for most examples of the 9-membered and 11-membered rings. One of the 11-membered rings is distinct, compared to the others, in that its main-chain part has a mirror-image conformation. Another of the 11-membered rings occurs at the interior of the variable domains of some antibodies and assists in linking the two beta-sheets. We observe one 9-membered ring structure in a dihydrofolate reductase complex in which the amide in the nicotinamide group of the ligand NADP is bound to the enzyme. Groups that can form hydrogen bonds in a similar way to amide groups occur in several nucleotide bases; we find one example of a 9-membered ring involving adenine and main-chain atoms in the FAD-protein complex of glutathione reductase. Both have conformations like those of the other 9-membered rings.

Pyrrolidine ring puckering in cis and trans-proline residues in proteins and polypeptides. Different puckers are favoured in certain situations.

In a set of proteins studied at high resolution by X-ray crystallography over a half of all cis and trans-proline residues could be unambiguously assigned to one of the two forms of pyrrolidine ring puckering, called UP and DOWN. Of these, 89% of the cis-proline residues exhibit the DOWN pucker, while the trans-proline residues, on average, are about evenly distributed between the two forms. Of trans-proline residues found in alpha-helices, 79% have the UP ring pucker. trans-proline residues occurring in other situations are more equally distributed between the two forms of pucker, although further generalizations may be possible. Proline residues in a set of crystal structures of short polypeptides were also examined. As in the protein sample, a tendency for the cis-proline residues to have the DOWN pucker was observed, but the effect was less pronounced.

Evidence for an ancestral core structure in nucleotide-binding proteins with the type A motif.

Many proteins that bind purine nucleotide triphosphates have a type A sequence motif. Only two classes of structures for such proteins are so far available from X-ray crystallography. We examined the tertiary structures of representatives of the two classes, porcine cytoplasmic adenylate kinase and Escherichia coli translational elongation factor Tu. Comparison of the two proteins suggests that the A motif may be just one part of a larger common core structure consisting of four parallel strands of beta-sheet sandwiched between four alpha-helices. This compact core structure comprises over one half of each protein. We speculate that A motif proteins have diverged from a common ancestor having this core structure.

Displaying inter-main chain hydrogen bond patterns in proteins.

Two computer graphics techniques for displaying hydrogen bonds between the main chains of different proteins are described, and illustrated for two thiol proteases. (The X-ray crystallography was performed by Kamphuis et al. in 1984, and by Baker and Dodson in 1980.) One is a three-dimensional model that can be manipulated in space; the hydrogen bonds are represented with the smoothed alpha-carbon plot of the polypeptide chain. In the other type of display, hydrogen bonds are viewed in relation to the one-dimensional sequence. Both types of picture facilitate visualization of hydrogen bond patterns, such that loop motifs, as well as alpha-helices and beta-sheets, can be examined easily. We suggest that such displays are useful as a general means of displaying whole proteins and whole domains because they reveal more information than do conventional simplified pictures of proteins, which focus exclusively on alpha-helices and beta-sheets. These techniques can be implemented on a UNIX-based computer graphics workstation. (UNIX is a trademark of Bell Telephone laboratories.)

Situations of gamma-turns in proteins. Their relation to alpha-helices, beta-sheets and ligand binding sites.

Gamma-turns occur as one of two possible enantiomers with regard to their main-chain structure, called classic and inverse. Of these, inverse ones are more common. Unlike other hydrogen bonds, those in inverse gamma-turns include a large proportion that are weak. If such hydrogen bonds are included, these turns may be said to be abundant in proteins. A significant number of inverse gamma-turns, usually weak ones, exist as consecutive turns in a structural feature, now called the 2.2(7)-helix, proposed for polypeptides as long ago as 1943 by Huggins. Most of these features occur within strands of beta-sheet. The less-weak inverse gamma-turns fall into several structural subgroups. They are frequently situated directly at either end of alpha-helices or of strands of beta-sheet, or adjacent to certain loop motifs. In general, they are well conserved during evolution and some are found at key positions in proteins. One occurs in the first hypervariable loop in the heavy chain of immunoglobulins.

Predicting the biologically active conformations of short polypeptides.

In general, the smaller a polypeptide is, the less well defined its three-dimensional structure. In spite of advances in structure determination, the conformations of short polypeptides, as bound to their receptors, are not always easy to predict. However, much information about polypeptide structure is available from three-dimensional structures of proteins. James Milner-White discusses its relevance to small polypeptides and considers other means of inferring their biologically active conformations, especially for those that form loops and turns.

Recurring loop motif in proteins that occurs in right-handed and left-handed forms. Its relationship with alpha-helices and beta-bulge loops.

A common feature of alpha-helices in proteins is a loop at the C-terminal end, with a characteristic hydrogen bond pattern. It is noted that several loops with the same structural features occur independently of alpha-helices; two are even situated at the loop ends of beta-hairpins. The name paperclip is suggested for loops possessing the appropriate hydrogen bonds. A number of features of paperclips are described: they exist in two classes, depending on the number of residues at the loop end; one class is very much commoner than the other. Two paperclips are found that belong to the common class, except that the main-chain conformation of each is the mirror image of that normally found. The majority of paperclips are shown to have tightly clustered sets of main-chain dihedral angles. These are somewhat similar to, but distinct from, a subgroup of another common family of loops that have been called beta-bulge loops; in the latter, the dihedral angles are also tightly clustered. The high degree of clustering in both cases is likely to be a result of steric constraints associated with hydrogen bond patterns at the ends of loops.