6wp8

Publication Abstract from PubMed

Microbial rhodopsins are versatile and ubiquitous retinal-binding proteins which function as light-driven ion pumps, light-gated ion channels and photosensors, with potential utility as optogenetic tools for altering membrane potential in target cells. Insights from crystal structures have been central for understanding proton, sodium, and chloride transport mechanisms of microbial rhodopsins. Two of three known groups of anion pumps, the archaeal halorhodopsins (HRs) and bacterial chloride-pumping rhodopsins (ClRs), have been structurally characterized. Here we report the structure of a representative of a recently discovered third group consisting of cyanobacterial chloride and sulfate ion-pumping rhodopsins, the Mastigocladopsis repens rhodopsin (MastR). Chloride-pumping MastR contains in its ion transport pathway a unique Thr-Ser-Asp (TSD) motif, which is involved in binding of a chloride ion. The structure reveals that the chloride-binding mode is more similar to HRs than ClRs, but the overall structure most closely resembles bacteriorhodopsin (BR), an archaeal proton pump. The MastR structure shows a trimer arrangement reminiscent of BR-like proton pumps and shows features at the extracellular side more similar to BR than the other chloride pumps. We further solved the structure of the MastR-T74D mutant which contains a single amino acid replacement in the TSD motif. We provide insights into why this point mutation can convert the MastR chloride pump into a proton pump, but cannot in HRs. Our study points at the importance of precise coordination and exact location of the water molecule in the active center of proton pumps, which serves as a bridge for the key proton transfer.

The crystal structures of a chloride-pumping microbial rhodopsin and its proton-pumping mutant illuminate proton transfer determinants.,Besaw JE, Ou WL, Morizumi T, Eger BT, Sanchez Vasquez JD, Chu JHY, Harris A, Brown LS, Miller RJD, Ernst OP J Biol Chem. 2020 Jul 23. pii: RA120.014118. doi: 10.1074/jbc.RA120.014118. PMID:32703899^[1]

From MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine.