Protein sectors: evolutionary units of three-dimensional structure.

ABSTRACT: Proteins display a hierarchy of structural features at primary, secondary, tertiary, and higher-order levels, an organization that guides our current understanding of their biological properties and evolutionary origins. Here, we reveal a structural organization distinct from this traditional hierarchy by statistical analysis of correlated evolution between amino acids. Applied to the S1A serine proteases, the analysis indicates a decomposition of the protein into three quasi-independent groups of correlated amino acids that we term "protein sectors." Each sector is physically connected in the tertiary structure, has a distinct functional role, and constitutes an independent mode of sequence divergence in the protein family. Functionally relevant sectors are evident in other protein famili

SUBMITTER: Halabi N 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3210731 | biostudies-literature | 2009 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature