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NMR Studies of Aromatic Ring Flips to Probe Conformational Fluctuations in Proteins

Akke, Mikael LU orcid and Weininger, Ulrich LU (2023) In Journal of Physical Chemistry B 127(3). p.591-599
Abstract

Aromatic residues form a significant part of the protein core, where they make tight interactions with multiple surrounding side chains. Despite the dense packing of internal side chains, the aromatic rings of phenylalanine and tyrosine residues undergo 180° rotations, or flips, which are mediated by transient and large-scale “breathing” motions that generate sufficient void volume around the aromatic ring. Forty years after the seminal work by Wagner and Wüthrich, NMR studies of aromatic ring flips are now undergoing a renaissance as a powerful means of probing fundamental dynamic properties of proteins. Recent developments of improved NMR methods and isotope labeling schemes have enabled a number of advances in addressing the... (More)

Aromatic residues form a significant part of the protein core, where they make tight interactions with multiple surrounding side chains. Despite the dense packing of internal side chains, the aromatic rings of phenylalanine and tyrosine residues undergo 180° rotations, or flips, which are mediated by transient and large-scale “breathing” motions that generate sufficient void volume around the aromatic ring. Forty years after the seminal work by Wagner and Wüthrich, NMR studies of aromatic ring flips are now undergoing a renaissance as a powerful means of probing fundamental dynamic properties of proteins. Recent developments of improved NMR methods and isotope labeling schemes have enabled a number of advances in addressing the mechanisms and energetics of aromatic ring flips. The nature of the transition states associated with ring flips can be described by thermodynamic activation parameters, including the activation enthalpy, activation entropy, activation volume, and also the isothermal volume compressibility of activation. Consequently, it is of great interest to study how ring flip rate constants and activation parameters might vary with protein structure and external conditions like temperature and pressure. The field is beginning to gather such data for aromatic residues in a variety of environments, ranging from surface exposed to buried. In the future, the combination of solution and solid-state NMR spectroscopy together with molecular dynamics simulations and other computational approaches is likely to provide detailed information about the coupled dynamics of aromatic rings and neighboring residues. In this Perspective, we highlight recent developments and provide an outlook toward the future.

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organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
in
Journal of Physical Chemistry B
volume
127
issue
3
pages
9 pages
publisher
The American Chemical Society (ACS)
external identifiers
  • pmid:36640108
  • scopus:85146610205
ISSN
1520-6106
DOI
10.1021/acs.jpcb.2c07258
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
41c63e8e-fe78-4d11-8efc-04e7b5e87202
date added to LUP
2023-02-15 15:11:39
date last changed
2024-04-18 18:52:29
@article{41c63e8e-fe78-4d11-8efc-04e7b5e87202,
  abstract     = {{<p>Aromatic residues form a significant part of the protein core, where they make tight interactions with multiple surrounding side chains. Despite the dense packing of internal side chains, the aromatic rings of phenylalanine and tyrosine residues undergo 180° rotations, or flips, which are mediated by transient and large-scale “breathing” motions that generate sufficient void volume around the aromatic ring. Forty years after the seminal work by Wagner and Wüthrich, NMR studies of aromatic ring flips are now undergoing a renaissance as a powerful means of probing fundamental dynamic properties of proteins. Recent developments of improved NMR methods and isotope labeling schemes have enabled a number of advances in addressing the mechanisms and energetics of aromatic ring flips. The nature of the transition states associated with ring flips can be described by thermodynamic activation parameters, including the activation enthalpy, activation entropy, activation volume, and also the isothermal volume compressibility of activation. Consequently, it is of great interest to study how ring flip rate constants and activation parameters might vary with protein structure and external conditions like temperature and pressure. The field is beginning to gather such data for aromatic residues in a variety of environments, ranging from surface exposed to buried. In the future, the combination of solution and solid-state NMR spectroscopy together with molecular dynamics simulations and other computational approaches is likely to provide detailed information about the coupled dynamics of aromatic rings and neighboring residues. In this Perspective, we highlight recent developments and provide an outlook toward the future.</p>}},
  author       = {{Akke, Mikael and Weininger, Ulrich}},
  issn         = {{1520-6106}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  number       = {{3}},
  pages        = {{591--599}},
  publisher    = {{The American Chemical Society (ACS)}},
  series       = {{Journal of Physical Chemistry B}},
  title        = {{NMR Studies of Aromatic Ring Flips to Probe Conformational Fluctuations in Proteins}},
  url          = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1021/acs.jpcb.2c07258}},
  doi          = {{10.1021/acs.jpcb.2c07258}},
  volume       = {{127}},
  year         = {{2023}},
}