New tools for automated high-resolution cryo-EM structure determination in RELION-3
- MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology, United Kingdom
- Stockholm University, Sweden
- European Molecular Biology Laboratory, Germany
Abstract
Here, we describe the third major release of RELION. CPU-based vector acceleration has been added in addition to GPU support, which provides flexibility in use of resources and avoids memory limitations. Reference-free autopicking with Laplacian-of-Gaussian filtering and execution of jobs from python allows non-interactive processing during acquisition, including 2D-classification, de novo model generation and 3D-classification. Per-particle refinement of CTF parameters and correction of estimated beam tilt provides higher-resolution reconstructions when particles are at different heights in the ice, and/or coma-free alignment has not been optimal. Ewald sphere curvature correction improves resolution for large particles. We illustrate these developments with publicly available data sets: together with a Bayesian approach to beam-induced motion correction it leads to resolution improvements of 0.2-0.7 Å compared to previous RELION versions.
Data availability
We mostly use publicly available data sets from the EMPIAR data base at EMBL-EBI. For this study, we have submitted to this data base our own data on the human gamma-secretase complex (EMPIAR-10194) and on the high-resolution apo-ferritin sample described in the text (EMPIAR-10200).
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An atomic structure of human gamma-secretase [2925 multi-frame micrographs composed of 20 frames each in MRCS format]Electron Microscopy Public Image Archive, EMPIAR-10194.
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Human apo-ferritin reconstructed in RELION-3.0Electron Microscopy Public Image Archive, EMPIAR-10200.
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2.2 A resolution cryo-EM structure of beta-galactosidase in complex with a cell-permeant inhibitorElectron Microscopy Public Image Archive, EMPIAR-10061.
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40 Degree Tilted Single-Particle CryoEM of Highly Preferred Orientated Influenza Hemagglutinin TrimerElectron Microscopy Public Image Archive, EMPIAR-10097.
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Bacteriophage P22 mature virion capsid proteinElectron Microscopy Public Image Archive, EMPIAR-10083.
Article and author information
Author details
Funding
Medical Research Council (MC_UP_A025_1013)
- Sjors HW Scheres
Swiss National Science Foundation (SNF: P2BSP2 168735)
- Jasenko Zivanov
Swedish Research Council (2017-04641)
- Erik Lindahl
Knut och Alice Wallenbergs Stiftelse
- Erik Lindahl
Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (Overseas Research Fellowship)
- Takanori Nakane
The funders had no role in study design, data collection and interpretation, or the decision to submit the work for publication.
Copyright
© 2018, Zivanov et al.
This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License permitting unrestricted use and redistribution provided that the original author and source are credited.
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New tools for automated high-resolution cryo-EM structure determination in RELION-3
eLife 7:e42166.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.42166
Further reading
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- Structural Biology and Molecular Biophysics
Experimental detection of residues critical for protein–protein interactions (PPI) is a time-consuming, costly, and labor-intensive process. Hence, high-throughput PPI-hot spot prediction methods have been developed, but they have been validated using relatively small datasets, which may compromise their predictive reliability. Here, we introduce PPI-hotspotID, a novel method for identifying PPI-hot spots using the free protein structure, and validated it on the largest collection of experimentally confirmed PPI-hot spots to date. We explored the possibility of detecting PPI-hot spots using (i) FTMap in the PPI mode, which identifies hot spots on protein–protein interfaces from the free protein structure, and (ii) the interface residues predicted by AlphaFold-Multimer. PPI-hotspotID yielded better performance than FTMap and SPOTONE, a webserver for predicting PPI-hot spots given the protein sequence. When combined with the AlphaFold-Multimer-predicted interface residues, PPI-hotspotID yielded better performance than either method alone. Furthermore, we experimentally verified several PPI-hotspotID-predicted PPI-hot spots of eukaryotic elongation factor 2. Notably, PPI-hotspotID can reveal PPI-hot spots not obvious from complex structures, including those in indirect contact with binding partners. PPI-hotspotID serves as a valuable tool for understanding PPI mechanisms and aiding drug design. It is available as a web server (https://ppihotspotid.limlab.dnsalias.org/) and open-source code (https://github.com/wrigjz/ppihotspotid/).
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- Structural Biology and Molecular Biophysics
In eukaryotes, RNAs transcribed by RNA Pol II are modified at the 5′ end with a 7-methylguanosine (m7G) cap, which is recognized by the nuclear cap binding complex (CBC). The CBC plays multiple important roles in mRNA metabolism, including transcription, splicing, polyadenylation, and export. It promotes mRNA export through direct interaction with a key mRNA export factor, ALYREF, which in turn links the TRanscription and EXport (TREX) complex to the 5′ end of mRNA. However, the molecular mechanism for CBC-mediated recruitment of the mRNA export machinery is not well understood. Here, we present the first structure of the CBC in complex with an mRNA export factor, ALYREF. The cryo-EM structure of CBC-ALYREF reveals that the RRM domain of ALYREF makes direct contact with both the NCBP1 and NCBP2 subunits of the CBC. Comparing CBC-ALYREF with other cellular complexes containing CBC and/or ALYREF components provides insights into the coordinated events during mRNA transcription, splicing, and export.
