Symmetry breaking and structural polymorphism in a bacterial microcompartment shell protein for choline utilization.

ABSTRACT: Bacterial microcompartments are protein-based organelles that carry out specialized metabolic functions in diverse bacteria. Their outer shells are built from several thousand protein subunits. Some of the architectural principles of bacterial microcompartments have been articulated, with lateral packing of flat hexameric BMC proteins providing the basic foundation for assembly. Nonetheless, a complete understanding has been elusive, partly owing to polymorphic mechanisms of assembly exhibited by most microcompartment types. An earlier study of one homologous BMC shell protein subfamily, EutS/PduU, revealed a profoundly bent, rather than flat, hexameric structure. The possibility of a specialized architectural role was hypothesized, but artifactual effects of crystallization could not be r

SUBMITTER: Ochoa JM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7586910 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature