Experimental support for the evolution of symmetric protein architecture from a simple peptide motif.

ABSTRACT: The majority of protein architectures exhibit elements of structural symmetry, and "gene duplication and fusion" is the evolutionary mechanism generally hypothesized to be responsible for their emergence from simple peptide motifs. Despite the central importance of the gene duplication and fusion hypothesis, experimental support for a plausible evolutionary pathway for a specific protein architecture has yet to be effectively demonstrated. To address this question, a unique "top-down symmetric deconstruction" strategy was utilized to successfully identify a simple peptide motif capable of recapitulating, via gene duplication and fusion processes, a symmetric protein architecture (the threefold symmetric β-trefoil fold). The folding properties of intermediary forms in this deconstruction ag

SUBMITTER: Lee J 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3017207 | biostudies-literature | 2011 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature