Miniproteins: Folding Equilibria, Pathways and Rates

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DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The efficient folding of polypeptide sequences into stable structures is one of the most fascinating and fundamentally important biorecognition phenomena. Studies of fold stability as well as folding pathways and rates are often more incisive when performed on minimalist constructs rather than full-sized proteins. The designed Trp-cage fold, consisting of only 18-19 essential residues, has proven to be an excellent system for measuring the fold stabilization contributions of intrinsic secondary structure preferences and individual hydrophobic, coulombic (saltbridge), and H-bonding interactions. Additional mutational studies of the Trp-cage are proposed. These, in conjunction with molecular dynamics simulations of folding trajectories, are aimed at determining, in detail, the pathway(s) of Trp-cage folding and at discovering alternate packing arrangements that could serve as the hydrophobic cores for related miniprotein motifs. Folding rates and cooperativity will be determined by several techniques (NMR line broadening, NMR chemical shift melts, and fluorescence-monitored T-jumps) to ascertain if the rates are dependent on contact order at the lower range of protein size. Extensively-mutated Trp-cage constructs, truncations and circular permutants will figure heavily in these studies. The present proposal continues to address polypeptide structuring requisites by both de novo design and as a fold optimization problem, but with an increasing emphasis on folding pathways and rates. The folding rate determinations should define the source (increased folding rate or decreased unfolding rate) of each of the structure-stabilizing interactions in the Trp-cage. Mutational effects on the rates of b-hairpin and three-stranded sheet formation will also be determined using dynamic NMR methods. Binding and novel structure stabilizing effects of the Trp side chain will be explored and quantitated. The design, construction, and optimization of a BaB3 miniprotein (a parallel b sheet resulting from the association of b strands at each end of an a helix) are also proposed. This construct mimics some features of the Bl domain of protein L. The designed BaB target fold is, however, novel in two major respects: the helix runs in the opposite direction of that in the Bl domain, and there is a left-handed crossover from a B strand to an alpha helix - the latter has never been observed in nature. The studies outlined in this proposal will provide structural and mechanistic insights concerning the requisites for fast and efficient folding that should yield protein engineering strategies for reducing disease-related misfolding events. More accurate methods for quantitating polypeptide structuring and folding rates will also result.