1EM8

Crystal structure of chi and psi subunit heterodimer from DNA POL III

Experimental Data Snapshot

  • Method: X-RAY DIFFRACTION
  • Resolution: 2.1 Å
  • R-Value Free: 0.265 
  • R-Value Work: 0.229 

wwPDB Validation 3D Report Full Report


This is version 1.2 of the entry. See complete history. 

Literature

Crystal structure of the chi:psi sub-assembly of the Escherichia coli DNA polymerase clamp-loader complex.

Gulbis, J.M., Kazmirski, S.L., Finkelstein, J., Kelman, Z., O'Donnell, M., Kuriyan, J.

(2004) Eur.J.Biochem. 271: 439-449


  • PubMed Abstract: 

    • The chi (chi) and psi (psi) subunits of Escherichia coli DNA polymerase III form a heterodimer that is associated with the ATP-dependent clamp-loader machinery. In E. coli, the chi:psi heterodimer serves as a bridge between the clamp-loader complex a ...

    The chi (chi) and psi (psi) subunits of Escherichia coli DNA polymerase III form a heterodimer that is associated with the ATP-dependent clamp-loader machinery. In E. coli, the chi:psi heterodimer serves as a bridge between the clamp-loader complex and the single-stranded DNA-binding protein. We determined the crystal structure of the chi:psi heterodimer at 2.1 A resolution. Although neither chi (147 residues) nor psi (137 residues) bind to nucleotides, the fold of each protein is similar to the folds of mononucleotide-(chi) or dinucleotide-(psi) binding proteins, without marked similarity to the structures of the clamp-loader subunits. Genes encoding chi and psi proteins are found to be readily identifiable in several bacterial genomes and sequence alignments showed that residues at the chi:psi interface are highly conserved in both proteins, suggesting that the heterodimeric interaction is of functional significance. The conservation of surface-exposed residues is restricted to the interfacial region and to just two other regions in the chi:psi complex. One of the conserved regions was found to be located on chi, distal to the psi interaction region, and we identified this as the binding site for a C-terminal segment of the single-stranded DNA-binding protein. The other region of sequence conservation is localized to an N-terminal segment of psi (26 residues) that is disordered in the crystal structure. We speculate that psi is linked to the clamp-loader complex by this flexible, but conserved, N-terminal segment, and that the chi:psi unit is linked to the single-stranded DNA-binding protein via the distal surface of chi. The base of the clamp-loader complex has an open C-shaped structure, and the shape of the chi:psi complex is suggestive of a loose docking within the crevice formed by the open faces of the delta and delta' subunits of the clamp-loader.

    Organizational Affiliation: 

    Laboratory of Molecular Biophysics, Howard Hughes Medical Institute, The Rockefeller University, New York, NY, USA.




Macromolecules

Find similar proteins by: Sequence  |  Structure

Entity ID: 1
MoleculeChainsSequence LengthOrganismDetails
DNA POLYMERASE III CHI SUBUNIT
A, C
147Escherichia coli (strain K12)Mutation(s): 0 
Gene Names: holC
EC: 2.7.7.7
Find proteins for P28905 (Escherichia coli (strain K12))
Go to UniProtKB:  P28905
Entity ID: 2
MoleculeChainsSequence LengthOrganismDetails
DNA POLYMERASE III PSI SUBUNIT
B, D
112Escherichia coli (strain K12)Mutation(s): 0 
Gene Names: holD
EC: 2.7.7.7
Find proteins for P28632 (Escherichia coli (strain K12))
Go to UniProtKB:  P28632
Experimental Data & Validation

Experimental Data

  • Method: X-RAY DIFFRACTION
  • Resolution: 2.1 Å
  • R-Value Free: 0.265 
  • R-Value Work: 0.229 
  • Space Group: P 1 21 1
Unit Cell:
Length (Å)Angle (°)
a = 64.377α = 90.00
b = 65.719β = 116.15
c = 73.429γ = 90.00
Software Package:
Software NamePurpose
CNSrefinement
SCALEPACKdata scaling
MLPHAREphasing
DENZOdata reduction

Structure Validation

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Entry History 

Deposition Data

Revision History 

  • Version 1.0: 2003-08-26
    Type: Initial release
  • Version 1.1: 2008-04-27
    Type: Version format compliance
  • Version 1.2: 2011-07-13
    Type: Version format compliance