Insight into the allosteric mechanism of Scapharca dimeric hemoglobin.

ABSTRACT: Allosteric regulation is an essential function of many proteins that control a variety of different processes such as catalysis, signal transduction, and gene regulation. Structural rearrangements have historically been considered the main means of communication between different parts of a protein. Recent studies have highlighted the importance, however, of changes in protein flexibility as an effective way to mediate allosteric communication across a protein. Scapharca dimeric hemoglobin (HbI) is the simplest possible allosteric system, with cooperative ligand binding between two identical subunits. Thermodynamic equilibrium studies of the binding of oxygen to HbI have shown that cooperativity is an entropically driven effect. The change in entropy of the system observed upon ligand bind

SUBMITTER: Laine JM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4245988 | biostudies-literature | 2014 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature