bi9b00900_si_001.pdf (4.61 MB)
Reconstructing the Remote Origins of a Fold Singleton from a Flavodoxin-Like Ancestor
journal contribution
posted on 2019-11-19, 21:13 authored by Saacnicteh Toledo-Patiño, Manish Chaubey, Murray Coles, Birte HöckerEvolutionary processes that led to the emergence of structured
protein domains left footprints in the sequences of modern proteins.
We searched for such hints employing state-of-the-art sequence analysis
and found evidence that the HemD-like fold emerged from the flavodoxin-like
fold through segment swap and gene duplication. To verify this hypothesis,
we reverted these evolutionary steps experimentally, constructing
a HemD-half that resulted in a protein with the canonical flavodoxin-like
architecture. These results of fold reconstruction from the sequence
of a different fold strongly support our hypothesis of common ancestry.
It further illustrates the plasticity of modern proteins to form new
folded proteins.