An official website of the United States government
Here’s how you know
Official websites use .gov
A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States.
Secure .gov websites use HTTPS
A lock (
) or https:// means you’ve safely connected to the .gov website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.
Engineering ClpS for Selective and Enhanced N-terminal Amino Acid Binding
Published
Author(s)
Jennifer A. Tullman, Zvi Kelman, John P. Marino
Abstract
One of the central challenges in the development of single-molecule protein sequencing technologies is achieving high-fidelity, sequential recognition and detection of specific amino acids that comprise the peptide sequence. An approach towards achieving this goal is to leverage naturally occurring proteins that function through recognition of amino (N)-terminal amino acids (NAAs). One such protein, the N-End Rule Pathway adaptor protein ClpS, natively recognizes NAAs on a peptide chain. The native ClpS protein has a high specificity albeit modest affinity for the amino acid Phe at the N-terminus but also recognizes the residues Trp, Tyr, and Leu at the N-terminal position. Here, we have employed directed evolution methods to select for ClpS variants with enhanced affinity and selectivity for two NAAs (Phe and Trp). Using this approach, two variants of the Agrobacterium tumefaciens ClpS protein with native residues 34-36 ProArgGlu mutated to ProMetSer and CysProSer were identified. Using in vitro surface binding assays, the ProMetSer variant was found to have enhanced affinity for Phe at the N-terminus with 7-fold tighter binding relative to wild-type ClpS; while, the CysProSer variant is shown to bind selectively to Trp over Phe at the N-terminus while having a greater affinity for both Trp and Phe.
Tullman, J.
, Kelman, Z.
and Marino, J.
(2019),
Engineering ClpS for Selective and Enhanced N-terminal Amino Acid Binding, Applied Microbiology and Biotechnology, [online], https://doi.org/10.1007/s00253-019-09624-2
(Accessed October 9, 2024)