Chemical synthesis of the precursor molecule of the Aequorea green fluorescent protein, subsequent folding, and development of fluorescence

被引:77
作者
Nishiuchi, Y
Inui, T
Nishio, H
Bódi, J
Kimura, T
Tsuji, FI
Sakakibara, S [1 ]
机构
[1] Prot Res Fdn, Peptide Inst, Minoh, Osaka 562, Japan
[2] Univ Calif San Diego, Scripps Inst Oceanog, Marine Biol Res Div, La Jolla, CA 92093 USA
关键词
N-[(9-hydroxymethyl)-2-fluorenyl]succinamic acid resin; segment condensation reaction; maximum protection strategy; protein folding; autocyclodehydration;
D O I
10.1073/pnas.95.23.13549
中图分类号
O [数理科学和化学]; P [天文学、地球科学]; Q [生物科学]; N [自然科学总论];
学科分类号
07 ; 0710 ; 09 ;
摘要
The present paper describes the total chemical synthesis of the precursor molecule of the Aequorea green fluorescent protein (GFP), The molecule is made up of 238 amino acid residues in a single polypeptide chain and is nonfluorescent, To carry out the synthesis, a procedure, first described in 1981 for the synthesis of complex peptides, was used. The procedure is based on performing segment condensation reactions in solution while providing maximum protection to the segment. The effectiveness of the procedure has been demonstrated by the synthesis of various biologically active peptides and small proteins, such as human angiogenin, a 123-residue protein analogue of ribonuclease A, human midkine, a 121-residue protein, and pleiotrophin, a 136-residue protein analogue of midkine, The GFP precursor molecule was synthesized from 26 fully protected segments in solution, and the final 238-residue peptide was treated with anhydrous hydrogen fluoride to obtain the precursor molecule of GFP containing two Cys (acetamidomethyl) residues. After removal of the acetamidomethyl groups, the product was dissolved in 0.1 M Tris HCl buffer (pH 8.0) in the presence of DTT, After several hours at room temperature, the solution began to emit a green fluorescence (lambda(max) = 509 nm) under near-UV light, Both fluorescence excitation and fluorescence emission spectra were measured and were found to have the same shape and maxima as those reported for native GFP, The present results demonstrate the utility of the segment condensation procedure in synthesizing large protein molecules such as GFP, The result also provides evidence that the formation of the chromophore in GFP is not dependent on any external cofactor.
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页码:13549 / 13554
页数:6
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