A sulfur-aromatic gate latch is essential for opening of the Orai1 channel pore
- Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, United States
- Hospital for Sick Children, Canada
- The Hospital for Sick Children, Canada
Abstract
Sulfur-aromatic interactions occur in the majority of protein structures, yet little is known about their functional roles in ion channels. Here, we describe a novel molecular motif, the M101 gate latch, which is essential for gating of human Orai1 channels via its sulfur-aromatic interactions with the F99 hydrophobic gate. Molecular dynamics simulations of different Orai variants reveal that the gate latch is engaged in open but not in closed channels. In experimental studies, we use metal ion bridges to show that promoting an M101-F99 bond directly activates Orai1, whereas disrupting this interaction triggers channel closure. Mutational analysis demonstrates that methionine at this position has a unique length, flexibility, and chemistry to act as an effective latch for the phenylalanine gate. Because sulfur-aromatic interactions provide additional stabilization compared to purely hydrophobic interactions, we postulate that the six M101-F99 pairs in the hexameric channel represent a substantial energetic contribution to Orai1 activation.
Data availability
All data generated or analysed during this study are included in the manuscript and supporting files.
Article and author information
Author details
Funding
National Institutes of Health (NS057499)
- Murali Prakriya
National Institutes of Health (F31NS101830)
- Priscilla S-W Yeung
Canadian Institutes of Health Research (MOP130461)
- Régis Pomès
National Institutes of Health (GM114210)
- Murali Prakriya
The funders had no role in study design, data collection and interpretation, or the decision to submit the work for publication.
Copyright
© 2020, Yeung 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.
Metrics
-
- 1,315
- views
-
- 217
- downloads
-
- 14
- citations
Views, downloads and citations are aggregated across all versions of this paper published by eLife.
Download links
A two-part list of links to download the article, or parts of the article, in various formats.
Downloads (link to download the article as PDF)
Open citations (links to open the citations from this article in various online reference manager services)
Cite this article (links to download the citations from this article in formats compatible with various reference manager tools)
A sulfur-aromatic gate latch is essential for opening of the Orai1 channel pore
eLife 9:e60751.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.60751
Further reading
-
- Computational and Systems Biology
- Structural Biology and Molecular Biophysics
Viral adhesion to host cells is a critical step in infection for many viruses, including monkeypox virus (MPXV). In MPXV, the H3 protein mediates viral adhesion through its interaction with heparan sulfate (HS), yet the structural details of this interaction have remained elusive. Using AI-based structural prediction tools and molecular dynamics (MD) simulations, we identified a novel, positively charged α-helical domain in H3 that is essential for HS binding. This conserved domain, found across orthopoxviruses, was experimentally validated and shown to be critical for viral adhesion, making it an ideal target for antiviral drug development. Targeting this domain, we designed a protein inhibitor, which disrupted the H3-HS interaction, inhibited viral infection in vitro and viral replication in vivo, offering a promising antiviral candidate. Our findings reveal a novel therapeutic target of MPXV, demonstrating the potential of combination of AI-driven methods and MD simulations to accelerate antiviral drug discovery.
-
- Chromosomes and Gene Expression
- Structural Biology and Molecular Biophysics
Type II nuclear receptors (T2NRs) require heterodimerization with a common partner, the retinoid X receptor (RXR), to bind cognate DNA recognition sites in chromatin. Based on previous biochemical and overexpression studies, binding of T2NRs to chromatin is proposed to be regulated by competition for a limiting pool of the core RXR subunit. However, this mechanism has not yet been tested for endogenous proteins in live cells. Using single-molecule tracking (SMT) and proximity-assisted photoactivation (PAPA), we monitored interactions between endogenously tagged RXR and retinoic acid receptor (RAR) in live cells. Unexpectedly, we find that higher expression of RAR, but not RXR, increases heterodimerization and chromatin binding in U2OS cells. This surprising finding indicates the limiting factor is not RXR but likely its cadre of obligate dimer binding partners. SMT and PAPA thus provide a direct way to probe which components are functionally limiting within a complex TF interaction network providing new insights into mechanisms of gene regulation in vivo with implications for drug development targeting nuclear receptors.
