title: Disulfide bond formation in prokaryotes: history, diversity and design.
abstract: The formation of structural disulfide bonds is essential for the function and stability of a great number of proteins, particularly those that are secreted. There exists a variety of dedicated cellular catalysts and pathways from archaea to humans that ensure the formation of native disulfide bonds. In this review we describe the initial discoveries of these pathways and report progress in recent years in our understanding of the diversity of these pathways in prokaryotes, including those newly discovered in some archaea. We will also discuss the various successful efforts to achieve laboratory-based evolution and design of synthetic disulfide bond formation machineries in the bacterium Escherichia coli. These latter studies have also led to new more general insights into the redox environment of the cytoplasm and bacterial cell envelope. This article is part of a Special Issue entitled: Thiol-Based Redox Processes.
authors.affiliation: Department of Microbiology and Immunobiology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA 02115, USA.
authors.forename: Feras
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Hatahet
authors.affiliation: Department of Microbiology and Immunobiology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA 02115, USA.
authors.forename: Dana
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Boyd
authors.affiliation: Department of Microbiology and Immunobiology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA 02115, USA. Electronic address: jon_beckwith@hms.harvard.edu.
authors.forename: Jon
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Beckwith
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D004220:Disulfides / Q000737:chemistry*; D006801:Humans; D010084:Oxidation-Reduction; D011387:Prokaryotic Cells / Q000378:metabolism*
chemical_list: D004220:Disulfides
keywords: Disulfide bond formation; DsbA; DsbB; Hyperthermophiles; PDI; VKOR