Structure of bradavidin-C-terminal residues act as intrinsic ligands

PLoS One. 2012;7(5):e35962. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0035962. Epub 2012 May 4.

Abstract

Bradavidin is a homotetrameric biotin-binding protein from Bradyrhizobium japonicum, a nitrogen fixing and root nodule-forming symbiotic bacterium of the soybean. Wild-type (wt) bradavidin has 138 amino acid residues, whereas the C-terminally truncated core-bradavidin has only 118 residues. We have solved the X-ray structure of wt bradavidin and found that the C-terminal amino acids of each subunit were uniquely bound to the biotin-binding pocket of an adjacent subunit. The biotin-binding pocket occupying peptide (SEKLSNTK) was named "Brad-tag" and it serves as an intrinsic stabilizing ligand in wt bradavidin. The binding of Brad-tag to core-bradavidin was analysed by isothermal titration calorimetry and a binding affinity of ∼25 µM was measured. In order to study the potential of Brad-tag, a green fluorescent protein tagged with Brad-tag was prepared and successfully concentrated from a bacterial cell lysate using core-bradavidin-functionalized Sepharose resin.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Affinity Labels / metabolism
  • Amino Acid Sequence
  • Animals
  • Binding Sites
  • Biotin / metabolism
  • Bradyrhizobium*
  • Carrier Proteins / chemistry*
  • Carrier Proteins / metabolism*
  • Crystallography, X-Ray
  • Ligands
  • Models, Molecular
  • Molecular Sequence Data
  • Protein Conformation
  • Protein Stability
  • Protein Subunits / chemistry
  • Protein Subunits / metabolism
  • Substrate Specificity

Substances

  • Affinity Labels
  • Carrier Proteins
  • Ligands
  • Protein Subunits
  • bradavidin protein, Bradyrhizobium japonicum
  • Biotin