Development of the concept for structure-aided rational design of bright fluorescent protein

荧光蛋白是生物学研究中不可缺少的工具。然而，荧光强度的增强是通过重复随机诱变来实现的，因此需要有效的改进方法。在这项研究中，我们确定了中间体的结构，这些中间体是通过提高荧光强度产生的明亮的荧光蛋白。从它们之间的比较中，我们发现了有助于改进的结构特征。突变体荧光强度增强，荧光发色团平面度增强，β链主链靠近荧光发色团稳定。结合目前正在建立的基于计算模拟的分子建模系统，期望通过进一步的研究，建立合理的明亮荧光蛋白设计理念。

Fluorescent proteins are used as indispensable tool for biological research. However, enhancement of the fluorescence intensity has been accomplished by repeating the random mutagenesis, thus the effective way for improvement has been required. In this study we determined structures of the intermediates those were generated through the improvement of the fluorescence intensity for a bright fluorescent protein. From the comparison among them, we found structural features contributing to the improvement. In the mutants fluorescence intensity has enhanced, planarity of fluorescent chromophore is enhanced and main chain of the beta strand comes close to the fluorescent chromophore for stabilization. In combination with currently creating molecular modeling system based on the computational simulation, establishment of the rational design concept for bright fluorescent protein is expected by further study.