A de novo protein confers copper resistance in Escherichia coli.

ABSTRACT:

Unlabelled

To survive environmental challenges, biological systems rely on proteins that were selected by evolution to function in particular cellular and conditional settings. With the advent of protein design and synthetic biology, it is now possible to construct novel proteins that are not biased by eons of selection in natural hosts. The availability of these sequences prompts us to ask whether natural biological organisms can use naïve-non-biological-proteins to enhance fitness in stressful environments. To address this question, we transformed a library of DNA sequences encoding ∼1.5 × 10(6) binary patterned de novo proteins into E. coli, and selected for sequences that enable growth in concentrations of copper that would otherwise be toxic. Several novel sequences were disco

SUBMITTER: Hoegler KJ 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4918413 | biostudies-literature | 2016 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature