Steven D Schwartz — Page 2

PubMed2002

Barrier passage and protein dynamics in enzymatically catalyzed reactions.

This review describes studies of particular enzymatically catalyzed reactions to investigate the possibility that catalysis is mediated by protein dynamics. That is, evolution has crafted the protein backbone of the enzyme to direct vibrations in such a fashion to speed reaction. The review presents the theoretical approach we have used to investigate this problem, but it is designed for the nonspecialist. The results show that in alcohol dehydrogenase, dynamic protein motion is in fact strongly coupled to chemical reaction in such a way as to promote catalysis. This result is in concert with both experimental data and interpretations for this and other enzyme systems studied in the laboratories of the two other investigators who have published reviews in this issue.

Catalysis↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Protein promoting vibrations in enzyme catalysis--a conserved evolutionary motif.

A computational method to identify residues important in creating a protein promoting vibration (PPV) in enzymes was previously developed and applied to horse liver alcohol dehydrogenase (HLADH), resulting in the identification of eight important residues. From these residues, we define a sequence motif, the PPV generating sequence, and find it to be unique and general to a larger group of alcohol dehydrogenases from diverse sources, demonstrating that nature has selected for the PPV generating sequence.

Alcohol Dehydrogenase↗