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Common prevalence of alanine and glycine in mobile reactive centre loops of serpins and viral fusion peptides: Do prions possess a fusion peptide?

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Summary

Serpin reactive centre loops and fusion peptides released by proteolytic cleavage are particularly mobile. Their amino acid compositions reveal a common and unusual abundance of alanine, accompanied by high levels of glycine. These two small residues, which are not simultaneously abundant in stable helices (standard or transmembrane), probably play an important role in mobility. Threonine and valine (also relatively small amino acids) are also abundant in these two kinds of peptides. Moreover, the known 3D structures of an uncleaved serpin reactive centre and a fusion peptide are strikingly similar. Such sequences possess many small residues and are found in several signal peptides and in PrP, a protein associated with spongi-form encephalopathies and resembling virus envelope proteins. These properties may be related to the infection mechanisms of these diseases.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Département des Macromolécules Biologiques, Laboratoire de Minéralogie-Cristallographie, CNRS URA09, Universités P6 et P7, Tour 16, Case 115, 4 Place Jussieu, F-75252, Paris Cedex 05, France

    Isabelle Callebaut, Anne Tasso & Jean Paul Mornon

  2. Faculté des Sciences Agronomiques, UER de Biologie moléculaire et Physiologie Animale, 2 Passage des Déportés, B-5030, Gembloux, Belgium

    Isabelle Callebaut & Arsène Burny

  3. Faculté des Sciences Agronomiques, UER de Microbiologie, 2 Passage des Déportés, B-5030, Gembloux, Belgium

    Isabelle Callebaut & Daniel Portetelle

  4. Laboratoire de Chimie Physique des Macromolécules aux Interfaces, Université Libre de Bruxelles, 206/2, Blvd. du Triomphe, B-1050, Brussels, Belgium

    Robert Brasseur

Authors
  1. Isabelle Callebaut
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  2. Anne Tasso
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  3. Robert Brasseur
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  4. Arsène Burny
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  5. Daniel Portetelle
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  6. Jean Paul Mornon
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Callebaut, I., Tasso, A., Brasseur, R. et al. Common prevalence of alanine and glycine in mobile reactive centre loops of serpins and viral fusion peptides: Do prions possess a fusion peptide?. J Computer-Aided Mol Des 8, 175–191 (1994). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00119866

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00119866

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