The Isolation of New Pore-Forming Toxins from the Sea Anemone Actinia fragacea Provides Insights into the Mechanisms of Actinoporin Evolution.

ABSTRACT: Random mutations and selective pressure drive protein adaptation to the changing demands of the environment. As a consequence, nature favors the evolution of protein diversity. A group of proteins subject to exceptional environmental stress and known for their widespread diversity are the pore-forming hemolytic proteins from sea anemones, known as actinoporins. In this study, we identified and isolated new isoforms of actinoporins from the sea anemone Actinia fragacea (fragaceatoxins). We characterized their hemolytic activity, examined their stability and structure, and performed a comparative analysis of their primary sequence. Sequence alignment reveals that most of the variability among actinoporins is associated with non-functional residues. The differences in the thermal behav

SUBMITTER: Morante K 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6669745 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature