Understanding intramembrane proteolysis: from protein dynamics to reaction kinetics.

Intramembrane proteolysis - cleavage of proteins within the plane of a membrane - is a widespread phenomenon that can contribute to the functional activation of substrates and is involved in several diseases. Although different families of intramembrane proteases have been discovered and characterized, we currently do not know how these enzymes discriminate between substrates and non-substrates, how site-specific cleavage is achieved, or which factors determine the rate of proteolysis. Focusing on γ-secretase and rhomboid proteases, we argue that answers to these questions may emerge from connecting experimental readouts, such as reaction kinetics and the determination of cleavage sites, to the structures and the conformational dynamics of substrates and enzymes.

Molecular basis for pH sensitivity and proton transfer in green fluorescent protein: protonation and conformational substates from electrostatic calculations.

We performed a theoretical study to elucidate the coupling between protonation states and orientation of protein dipoles and buried water molecules in green fluorescent protein, a versatile biosensor for protein targeting. It is shown that the ionization equilibria of the wild-type green fluorescent protein-fluorophore and the internal proton-binding site E222 are mutually interdependent. Two acid-base transitions of the fluorophore occur in the presence of neutral (physiologic pH) and ionized (pH > 12) E222, respectively. In the pH-range from approximately 8 to approximately 11 ionized and neutral sites are present in constant ratio, linked by internal proton transfer. The results indicate that modulation of the internal proton sharing by structural fluctuations or chemical variations of aligning residues T203 and S65 cause drastic changes of the neutral/anionic ratio-despite similar physiologic fluorophore pK(a) s. Moreover, we find that dipolar heterogeneities in the internal hydrogen-bond network lead to distributed driving forces for excited-state proton transfer. A molecular model for the unrelaxed surrounding after deprotonation is discussed in relation to pathways providing fast ground-state recovery or slow stabilization of the anion. The calculated total free energy for excited-state deprotonation ( approximately 19 k(B)T) and ground-state reprotonation ( approximately 2 k(B)T) is in accordance with absorption and emission data (