Biological Crystallography

Acta Cryst. (2009). D65, 303-311  [ doi:10.1107/S0907444909000699 ]

Structure, modifications and ligand-binding properties of rat profilin 2a

T. Haikarainen, W.-Q. Chen, G. Lubec and P. Kursula

Synopsis: The high-resolution crystal structure of unliganded rat profilin 2a has been determined. In addition, its post-translational modifications and ligand-binding properties have been studied.

PDB reference: 2vk3

Online 19 March 2009

Acta Cryst. (2009). D65, 312-325  [ doi:10.1107/S0907444909002170 ]

Mycobacterium tuberculosis pantothenate kinase: possible changes in location of ligands during enzyme action

B. Chetnani, S. Das, P. Kumar, A. Surolia and M. Vijayan

Synopsis: The crystal structures of various binary and ternary complexes of M. tuberculosis pantothenate kinase indicate possible changes in the location of ligands during enzyme action.

PDB references: 2zse, 2zsf, 2zsa, 2zs7, 2zs9, 2zsd, 2zs8 and 2zsb

Online 19 March 2009

Acta Cryst. (2009). D65, 326-331  [ doi:10.1107/S0907444909002200 ]

Use of an in-house approach to study the three-dimensional structures of various outer membrane proteins: structure of the alcaligin outer membrane transporter FauA from Bordetella pertussis

K. Brillet, A. Meksem, E. Lauber, C. Reimmann and D. Cobessi

Synopsis: Using an in-house protocol for the expression, purification and crystallization of outer membrane proteins belonging to the TonB-dependent transporter family, the crystal structure of the alcaligin outer membrane protein FauA from B. pertussis was solved at 2.3 Å resolution and X-ray diffraction data were collected for three other targets.

PDB reference: 3efm

Online 19 March 2009

Acta Cryst. (2009). D65, 332-338  [ doi:10.1107/S0907444909003102 ]

Structure analysis of the conserved methyltransferase domain of human trimethylguanosine synthase TGS1

T. Monecke, A. Dickmanns, A. Strasser and R. Ficner

Synopsis: The structure of the conserved methyltransferase domain of human trimethylguanosine synthase 1 bound to the cap analogue m⁷GpppA was solved by means of selenomethionine MAD.

PDB reference: 3egi

Online 19 March 2009

Acta Cryst. (2009). D65, 339-347  [ doi:10.1107/S0907444909003539 ]

Structural improvement of unliganded simian immunodeficiency virus gp120 core by normal-mode-based X-ray crystallographic refinement

X. Chen, M. Lu, B. K. Poon, Q. Wang and J. Ma

Synopsis: The structural model of the unliganded and fully glycosylated simian immunodeficiency virus gp120 core determined to 4.0 Å resolution was substantially improved using a recently developed normal-mode-based anisotropic B-factor refinement method.

PDB reference: 3fus

Online 19 March 2009

Acta Cryst. (2009). D65, 348-355  [ doi:10.1107/S0907444909003783 ]

Application of molecular replacement to protein powder data from image plates

J. A. Doebbler and R. B. Von Dreele

Synopsis: The structure of hen egg-white lysozyme was determined using powder diffraction data recorded on an image plate by molecular replacement using human lysozyme as the search model.

Online 19 March 2009

Acta Cryst. (2009). D65, 356-365  [ doi:10.1107/S0907444909004727 ]

Structure of Thermotoga maritima TM0439: implications for the mechanism of bacterial GntR transcription regulators with Zn²⁺-binding FCD domains

M. Zheng, D. R. Cooper, N. E. Grossoehme, M. Yu, L.-W. Hung, M. Cieslik, U. Derewenda, S. A. Lesley, I. A. Wilson, D. P. Giedroc and Z. S. Derewenda

Synopsis: Here, the crystal structure of TM0439, a GntR regulator with an FCD domain found in the Thermotoga maritima genome, is described.

PDB reference: 3fms

Online 19 March 2009

Acta Cryst. (2009). D65, 366-374  [ doi:10.1107/S090744490900540X ]

Reducing radiation damage in macromolecular crystals at synchrotron sources

E. A. Stern, Y. Yacoby, G. T. Seidler, K. P. Nagle, M. P. Prange, A. P. Sorini, J. J. Rehr and A. Joachimiak

Synopsis: A strategy is presented that increases the separation of the diffracting regions of macromolecular crystals from their damaged portions, thus increasing their survival.

Online 19 March 2009

Acta Cryst. (2009). D65, 375-378  [ doi:10.1107/S0907444909002327 ]

Tryptophan as a three-way switch in regulating the function of the secretory signalling glycoprotein (SPS-40) from mammary glands: structure of SPS-40 complexed with 2-methylpentane-2,4-diol at 1.6 Å resolution

P. Sharma, N. Singh, M. Sinha, S. Sharma, M. Perbandt, C. Betzel, P. Kaur, A. Srinivasan and T. P. Singh

Synopsis: The crystal structure of 2-methylpentane-2,4-diol inhibited secretory signalling glycoprotein (SPS-40) has been determined at 1.6 Å resolution. Trp78 works as a functional switch in these proteins by adopting pinched, stacked and obstructive conformations as observed in native, complexed with hexasaccharide and 2-methypentane-2,4-diol, respectively.

PDB reference: 2pi6

Online 19 March 2009

Acta Cryst. (2009). D65, 379-382  [ doi:10.1107/S090744490900256X ]

On the possibility of using polycrystalline material in the development of structure-based generic assays

M. Allaire, N. Moiseeva, C. E. Botez, M. A. Engel and P. W. Stephens

Synopsis: The correlation coefficients calculated between raw powder diffraction profiles can be used to identify ligand-bound/unbound states of lysozyme.

Online 19 March 2009

Acta Cryst. (2009). D65, 383-387  [ doi:10.1107/S0907444909002522 ]

Structure of the diaminopimelate epimerase DapF from Mycobacterium tuberculosis

V. Usha, L. G. Dover, D. I. Roper, K. Fütterer and G. S. Besra

Synopsis: Diaminopimelate (DAP) epimerase catalyses the interconversion of the D,L and L,L forms of diaminopimelic acid, which is a key component of the pentapeptide linker in bacterial peptidoglycan. The crystal structure of M. tuberculosis DAP epimerase is reported at a resolution of 2.6 Å.

PDB reference: 3fve

Online 19 March 2009

Acta Cryst. (2009). D65, 388-392  [ doi:10.1107/S0907444909003382 ]

Pseudo-merohedral twinning in monoclinic crystals of wild-type human brain neuroglobin

D. Hamdane, C. Lechauve, M. C. Marden and B. Golinelli-Pimpaneau

Synopsis: Pseudo-merohedral twinning was detected in a monoclinic P2₁ crystal form of wild-type human brain neuroglobin.

Online 19 March 2009

Acta Cryst. (2009). D65, 393-398  [ doi:10.1107/S0907444909003266 ]

The restriction enzyme SgrAI: structure solution via combination of poor MIRAS and MR phases

P. W. Dunten, E. J. Little and N. C. Horton

Synopsis: Phase information from both MIRAS and MR was used to produce an interpretable electron-density map of the novel type II restriction endonuclease SgrAI bound to DNA. The MR solution corrected an instructive error in the initially chosen averaging transformation.

Online 19 March 2009

Acta Cryst. (2009). D65, 399-402  [ doi:10.1107/S090744490900451X ]

PDB Editor: a user-friendly Java-based Protein Data Bank file editor with a GUI

J. Lee and S.-H. Kim

Synopsis: PDB Editor, written in Java Swing GUI, allows the user to selectively search, select, extract and edit information in Protein Data Bank file format.

Online 19 March 2009