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Protein-peptide complex crystallization: a case study on the ERK2 mitogen-activated protein kinase.

ABSTRACT: Linear motifs normally bind with only medium binding affinity (Kd of ?0.1-10?µM) to shallow protein-interaction surfaces on their binding partners. The crystallization of proteins in complex with linear motif-containing peptides is often challenging because the energy gained upon crystal packing between symmetry mates in the crystal may be on a par with the binding energy of the protein-peptide complex. Furthermore, for extracellular signal-regulated kinase 2 (ERK2) the protein-peptide docking surface is comprised of a small hydrophobic surface patch that is often engaged in the crystal packing of apo ERK2 crystals. Here, a rational surface-engineering approach is presented that involves mutating protein surface residues that are distant from the peptide-binding ERK2 docking groove to alanines. These ERK2 surface mutations decrease the chance of `unwanted' crystal packing of ERK2 and the approach led to the structure determination of ERK2 in complex with new docking peptides. These findings highlight the importance of negative selection in crystal engineering for weakly binding protein-peptide complexes.

SUBMITTER: Gogl G

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3605046 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Protein-peptide complex crystallization: a case study on the ERK2 mitogen-activated protein kinase.

Gógl Gergő G Törő Imre I Reményi Attila A

Acta crystallographica. Section D, Biological crystallography 20130216 Pt 3

Linear motifs normally bind with only medium binding affinity (Kd of ∼0.1-10 µM) to shallow protein-interaction surfaces on their binding partners. The crystallization of proteins in complex with linear motif-containing peptides is often challenging because the energy gained upon crystal packing between symmetry mates in the crystal may be on a par with the binding energy of the protein-peptide complex. Furthermore, for extracellular signal-regulated kinase 2 (ERK2) the protein-peptide docking s ...[more]

PMID: 23519423

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Project description:Mitogen-activated protein kinases (MAPK) are important regulatory units in cells and they take part in the regulation of many cellular functions such as cell division, differentiation or apoptosis. All MAPKs have a shallow docking groove that interacts with linear binding motifs of their substrate proteins and their regulatory proteins such as kinases, phosphatases, scaffolds. Inhibition of these protein-protein interactions may reduce or abolish the activity of the targeted kinase. Based on the wide range of their biological activity, this kind of inhibition can be useful in the treatment of many disorders like tumors, inflammation or undesired cell apoptosis. In this study a linear binding motif from the RHDF1 protein-a 15 amino acids long peptide-was selected for optimization to increase its cellular uptake but retaining its low micromolar binding affinity. First, we synthesized an octaarginine conjugate that showed efficient cellular uptake. Next, we set out to reduce the size of this construct. We were able to decrease the length of the original peptide, and to increase its cellular uptake with specific chemical modifications. These new constructs bound better to ERK2 and p38 kinases than the original peptide and they showed markedly increased cellular uptake. The new octaarginine conjugate and one of the minimized bicyclic derivatives could inhibit the phosphorylation of intracellular ERK or p38. However, the modulation of MAPK phosphorylation levels by these cell-penetrating peptides were complex, despite that in biochemical assays they all inhibited MAPK-substrate binding as well as phosphorylation. The optimized peptides depending on the applied concentration caused an expected decrease, but also some unexpected increase in MAPK phosphorylation patterns in the cell. This possibly reflects the complexity of MAPK docking groove mediated protein-protein interactions including bone fide MAPK clients such activator kinases, deactivating phosphatases or regulatory scaffolds. Thus, our findings with optimized cell-penetrating "inhibitory" peptides highlight the opportunities but also the pitfalls of docking peptide based MAPK activity regulation and call for a better quantitative understanding of MAPK mediated protein-protein interactions in cells.

Dataset Information

Protein-peptide complex crystallization: a case study on the ERK2 mitogen-activated protein kinase.

Publications

Protein-peptide complex crystallization: a case study on the ERK2 mitogen-activated protein kinase.

Similar Datasets

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