title: Improving coiled-coil stability by optimizing ionic interactions.
abstract: Alpha-helical coiled coils are a common protein oligomerization motif stabilized mainly by hydrophobic interactions occurring along the coiled-coil interface. We have recently designed and solved the structure of a two-heptad repeat coiled-coil peptide that is stabilized further by a complex network of inter- and intrahelical salt-bridges in addition to the hydrophobic interactions. Here, we extend and improve the de novo design of this two heptad-repeat peptide by four newly designed peptides characterized by different types of ionic interactions. The contribution of these different types of ionic interactions to coiled-coil stability are analyzed by CD spectroscopy and analytical ultracentrifugation. We show that all peptides are highly alpha-helical and two of them are 100% dimeric under physiological conditions. Furthermore, we have solved the X-ray structure of the most stable of these peptides and the rational design principles are verified by comparing this structure to the structure of the parent peptide. We show that by combining the most favorable inter- and intrahelical salt-bridge arrangements it is possible to design coiled-coil oligomerization domains with improved stability properties.
authors.affiliation: M.E. Müller Institute for Structural Biology, Biozentrum, University of Basel, Klingelbergstrasse 70, CH-4056 Basel, Switzerland. peter.burkhard@unibas.ch
authors.forename: Peter
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Burkhard
authors.forename: Sergei
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Ivaninskii
authors.forename: Ariel
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Lustig
mesh_terms: D055592:Biophysical Phenomena; D001703:Biophysics; D002942:Circular Dichroism; D018360:Crystallography, X-Ray; D015195:Drug Design; D004355:Drug Stability; D008958:Models, Molecular; D009994:Osmolar Concentration; D010455:Peptides / Q000737:chemistry*; D017510:Protein Folding; D020836:Protein Structure, Quaternary; D017433:Protein Structure, Secondary; D017434:Protein Structure, Tertiary; D014461:Ultracentrifugation
chemical_list: D010455:Peptides