An all-out assault on SARS-CoV-2 replication

The coronavirus pandemic has had a huge impact on public health with over 165 million people infected, 3.4 million deaths and a hugely deleterious effect on most economies. While vaccination effectively protects against the disease it is likely that viruses will evolve that can replicate in hosts immunised with the present vaccines. Thus, there is a great unmet need for effective antivirals that can block the development of serious disease in infected patients. The seven papers published in this issue of the Biochemical Journal address this need by expressing and purifying components required for viral replication, developing biochemical assays for these components and using the assays to screen a library of pre-existing pharmaceuticals for drugs that inhibited the target in vitro and inhibited viral replication in cell culture. The candidate drugs obtained are potential antivirals that may protect against SARS-CoV-2 infection. While not all the antiviral candidates will make it through to the clinic, they will be useful tool compounds and can act as the starting point for further drug discovery programmes.

Abstract P-45: Structure of the Bacteriophage AR9 Bacillus Subtilis Chaperonin According to Cryo-Electron Microscopy

Background: Chaperonins are a family of molecular chaperones Hsp60 (heat shock proteins 60). GroEL is a bacterial chaperonin. It ensures the correct folding of proteins, using the energy of ATP hydrolysis. Three-dimensional reconstructions of its predicted orthologs were obtained and biochemically characterized in free and nucleotide-bound states for bacteriophages EL Pseudomonas aeruginosa, OBP Pseudomonas fluorescens (Kurochkina, L. P. et al., Journal of virology, 2012; Semenyuk, P. I. et al., Biochemical Journal, 2016; Stanishneva-Konovalova, T. B. et al., Journal of Structural Biology, 2020). Physicochemical studies were carried out for the bacteriophage AR9 Bacillus Subtilis and confirmed that the protein has chaperone activity and does not require co-chaperonin to function (Semenyuk P. I. et al., International Journal of Biological Macromolecules, 2020). Methods: The recombinant chaperonin of the B. subtilis bacterial phage AR9 (gp228) was isolated and purified in a free state and vitrified in Vitrobot Mark IV. Data were collected using a Titan Krios cryo-TEM and processed in Warp, RELION and cryoSPARC software. Results: The final structures of the chaperonin were reconstructed with a C1 and C7 symmetry at the resolution of 4.5 Å and 4.0 Å respectively. Significant heterogeneity of the apical domains was addressed further using 3D classification and symmetry expansion in RELION resulting in a set of classes reflecting the conformational transition of the subunits between different states. At least four different conformational states of the subunit were clearly resolved. Conclusion: Gp228 structure show similarities between bacteriophage chaperonin and also bacterial chaperonin GroEL. It is formed by a single ring consisting of seven identical subunits, each has three domains: equatorial, intermediate, and apical. The subunits of the apo-form chaperonin Gp228 exhibit significant conformational flexibility in the apical and intermediate domains.

Protecting P-type plasma membrane H+-ATPases from ROS

P-type ATPase are ubiquitous transport proteins across all kingdoms of life. These proteins share a common mechanism involving phosphorylation of an invariant aspartate to facilitate movement of substrates from protons to phospholipids across cellular membranes. In this issue of the Biochemical Journal, Welle et al. identify a conserved cysteine near the functionally critical aspartate of P-type plasma membrane H+-ATPases that protects the protein from reactive oxygen species.

Two routes of direct intercellular communication in brain cancer

Glioblastoma is a particularly challenging disease characterized by the connection of tumor cells to functional multicellular networks that effectively resist therapies. In this issue of Biochemical Journal, Pinto et al. report the discovery of two distinct classes of intercellular membrane tube connections, tunneling nanotubes and tumor microtubes, in the same state-of-the-art culture model of patient-derived glioblastoma material. These findings contribute to our understanding of the heterogeneity of intercellular membrane tubes in health and disease, and pave the way for future functional studies on their various roles for disease progression and tumor resistance.

Simultaneous detection of reciprocal interactions between calmodulin, Ca2+ and molecular targets: a focus on the calmodulin-RyR2 complex

In a recent issue of Biochemical Journal, Brohus et al. (Biochem. J.476, 193–209) investigated the interaction between the ubiquitous intracellular Ca2+-sensor calmodulin (CaM) and peptides that mimic different structural regions of the cardiac ryanodine receptor (RyR2) at different Ca2+ concentrations. For the purpose, a novel bidimensional titration assay based on changes in fluorescence anisotropy was designed. The study identified the CaM domains that selectively bind to a specific CaM-binding domain in RyR2 and demonstrated that the interaction occurs essentially under Ca2+-saturating conditions. This study provides an elegant and experimentally accessible framework for detailed molecular investigations of the emerging life-threatening arrhythmia diseases associated with mutations in the genes encoding CaM. Furthermore, by allowing the measurement of the equilibrium dissociation constant in a protein–protein complex as a function of [Ca2+], the methodology presented by Brohus et al. may have broad applicability to the study of Ca2+ signalling.

The V369M Gcgr knock-in mice are a precision medicine model of mild Mahvash disease

The detailed metabolic characterization of the glucagon receptor (Gcgr)V369M+/+ mutant mice described in Lin et al. in the Biochemical Journal is of interest and resulting in the expected metabolic profile. We would like to point out that these mice might also be extremely useful as a precision medicine model of mild Mahvash disease, a rare hereditary pancreatic neuroendocrine tumor syndrome characterized by inactivating mutations in the glucagon receptor. Further characterization of pancreas morphology and histology in the GcgrV369M+/+ mice at more advanced ages will be critically important to understand mild Mahvash disease in humans.

Expanding our understanding of the role polyprotein conformation plays in the coronavirus life cycle

Coronavirus are the causative agents in many globally concerning respiratory disease outbreaks such as severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS) and coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19). It is therefore important that we improve our understanding of how the molecular components of the virus facilitate the viral life cycle. These details will allow for the design of effective interventions. Krichel and coauthors in their article in the Biochemical Journal provide molecular details of how the viral polyprotein (nsp7–10) produced from the positive single stranded RNA genome, is cleaved to form proteins that are part of the replication/transcription complex. The authors highlight the impact the polyprotein conformation has on the cleavage efficiency of the main protease (Mpro) and hence the order of release of non-structural proteins 7–10 (nsp7–10) of the SARS-CoV. Cleavage order is important in controlling viral processes and seems to have relevance in terms of the protein–protein complexes formed. The authors made use of mass spectrometry to advance our understanding of the mechanism by which coronaviruses control nsp 7, 8, 9 and 10 production in the virus life cycle.

New structural insights into bacterial sulfoacetaldehyde and taurine metabolism

In last year's issue 4 of Biochemical Journal, Zhou et al. (Biochem J. 476, 733–746) kinetically and structurally characterized the reductase IsfD from Klebsiella oxytoca that catalyzes the reversible reduction in sulfoacetaldehyde to the corresponding alcohol isethionate. This is a key step in detoxification of the carbonyl intermediate formed in bacterial nitrogen assimilation from the α-aminoalkanesulfonic acid taurine. In 2019, the work on sulfoacetaldehyde reductase IsfD was the exciting start to a quite remarkable series of articles dealing with structural elucidation of proteins involved in taurine metabolism as well as the discovery of novel degradation pathways in bacteria.

Reading the phosphorylation code: binding of the 14-3-3 protein to multivalent client phosphoproteins

Many major protein–protein interaction networks are maintained by ‘hub’ proteins with multiple binding partners, where interactions are often facilitated by intrinsically disordered protein regions that undergo post-translational modifications, such as phosphorylation. Phosphorylation can directly affect protein function and control recognition by proteins that ‘read’ the phosphorylation code, re-wiring the interactome. The eukaryotic 14-3-3 proteins recognizing multiple phosphoproteins nicely exemplify these concepts. Although recent studies established the biochemical and structural basis for the interaction of the 14-3-3 dimers with several phosphorylated clients, understanding their assembly with partners phosphorylated at multiple sites represents a challenge. Suboptimal sequence context around the phosphorylated residue may reduce binding affinity, resulting in quantitative differences for distinct phosphorylation sites, making hierarchy and priority in their binding rather uncertain. Recently, Stevers et al. [Biochemical Journal (2017) 474: 1273–1287] undertook a remarkable attempt to untangle the mechanism of 14-3-3 dimer binding to leucine-rich repeat kinase 2 (LRRK2) that contains multiple candidate 14-3-3-binding sites and is mutated in Parkinson's disease. By using the protein-peptide binding approach, the authors systematically analyzed affinities for a set of LRRK2 phosphopeptides, alone or in combination, to a 14-3-3 protein and determined crystal structures for 14-3-3 complexes with selected phosphopeptides. This study addresses a long-standing question in the 14-3-3 biology, unearthing a range of important details that are relevant for understanding binding mechanisms of other polyvalent proteins.