1dqc

Publication Abstract from PubMed

Tachycitin, a 73-residue polypeptide having antimicrobial activity is present in the hemocyte of horseshoe crab (Tachypleus tridentatus). The first three-dimensional structure of invertebrate chitin-binding protein was determined for tachycitin using two-dimensional nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy. The measurements indicate that the structure of tachycitin is largely divided into N- and C-terminal domains; the former comprises a three-stranded beta-sheet and the latter a two-stranded beta-sheet following a short helical turn. The latter structural motif shares a significant tertiary structural similarity with the chitin-binding domain of plant chitin-binding protein. This result is thought to provide faithful experimental evidence to the recent hypothesis that chitin-binding proteins of invertebrates and plants are correlated by a convergent evolution process.

Chitin-binding proteins in invertebrates and plants comprise a common chitin-binding structural motif.,Suetake T, Tsuda S, Kawabata S, Miura K, Iwanaga S, Hikichi K, Nitta K, Kawano K J Biol Chem. 2000 Jun 16;275(24):17929-32. PMID:10770921^[1]

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