Biological Assembly 1  

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Global Symmetry: Asymmetric - C1 
Global Stoichiometry: Monomer - A 

Biological assembly 1 assigned by authors and generated by PISA (software)

Macromolecule Content

• Total Structure Weight: 31268.27 
• Atom Count: 2205 
• Residue Count: 266 
• Unique protein chains: 1

3UJ9

Phosphoethanolamine methyltransferase from Plasmodium falciparum in complex with phosphocholine

• DOI: 10.2210/pdb3UJ9/pdb

• Classification: TRANSFERASE
• Organism(s): Plasmodium falciparum
• Expression System: Escherichia coli


• Deposited: 2011-11-07 Released: 2011-11-30 
• Deposition Author(s): Lee, S.G., Kim, Y., Alpert, T.D., Nagata, A., Jez, J.M.

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Experimental Data Snapshot

• Method: X-RAY DIFFRACTION
• Resolution: 1.24 Å
• R-Value Free: 0.173 
• R-Value Work: 0.147 

Literature

Structure and reaction mechanism of phosphoethanolamine methyltransferase from the malaria parasite Plasmodium falciparum: an antiparasitic drug target.

Lee, S.G., Kim, Y., Alpert, T.D., Nagata, A., Jez, J.M.

(2012) J.Biol.Chem. 287: 1426-1434

• PubMed: 22117061 
• DOI: 10.1074/jbc.M111.315267
• Primary Citation of Related Structures:  
  3UJD, 3UJC, 3UJB, 3UJA, 3UJ8, 3UJ7, 3UJ6


• PubMed Abstract: 
  

In the malarial parasite Plasmodium falciparum, a multifunctional phosphoethanolamine methyltransferase (PfPMT) catalyzes the methylation of phosphoethanolamine (pEA) to phosphocholine for membrane biogenesis. This pathway is also found in plant and nematodes, but PMT from these organisms use multiple methyltransferase domains for the S-adenosylmethionine (AdoMet) reactions. Because PfPMT is essential for normal growth and survival of Plasmodium and is not found in humans, it is an antiparasitic target. Here we describe the 1.55 Å resolution crystal structure of PfPMT in complex with AdoMet by single-wavelength anomalous dispersion phasing. In addition, 1.19-1.52 Å resolution structures of PfPMT with pEA (substrate), phosphocholine (product), sinefungin (inhibitor), and both pEA and S-adenosylhomocysteine bound were determined. These structures suggest that domain rearrangements occur upon ligand binding and provide insight on active site architecture defining the AdoMet and phosphobase binding sites. Functional characterization of 27 site-directed mutants identifies critical active site residues and suggests that Tyr-19 and His-132 form a catalytic dyad. Kinetic analysis, isothermal titration calorimetry, and protein crystallography of the Y19F and H132A mutants suggest a reaction mechanism for the PMT. Not only are Tyr-19 and His-132 required for phosphobase methylation, but they also form a "catalytic" latch that locks ligands in the active site and orders the site for catalysis. This study provides the first insight on this antiparasitic target enzyme essential for survival of the malaria parasite; however, further studies of the multidomain PMT from plants and nematodes are needed to understand the evolutionary division of metabolic function in the phosphobase pathway of these organisms.

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Organizational Affiliation: 

Department of Biology, Washington University, St. Louis, Missouri 63130, USA.

Macromolecules

Find similar proteins by: Sequence  |  Structure

Entity ID: 1
Molecule	Chains	Sequence Length	Organism	Details
Phosphoethanolamine N-methyltransferase	A	266	Plasmodium falciparum	Mutation(s): 0  Gene Names: PMT
Find proteins for Q6T755 (Plasmodium falciparum) Go to UniProtKB:  Q6T755

Small Molecules

Ligands 1 Unique
ID	Chains	Name / Formula / InChI Key	2D Diagram & Interactions
PC	A	PHOSPHOCHOLINE C5 H15 N O4 P YHHSONZFOIEMCP-UHFFFAOYSA-O

External Ligand Annotations
ID	Binding Affinity (Sequence Identity %)
PC	Kd: 23400 nM BINDINGMOAD
PC	Kd: 23400 nM PDBBIND

Experimental Data & Validation

Experimental Data

• Method: X-RAY DIFFRACTION
• Resolution: 1.24 Å
• R-Value Free: 0.173 
• R-Value Work: 0.147 
• Space Group: C 1 2 1

Unit Cell:

Length (Å)	Angle (°)
a = 90.077	α = 90.00
b = 43.982	β = 109.07
c = 77.032	γ = 90.00

Software Package:

Software Name	Purpose
HKL-3000	data collection
HKL-3000	data reduction
PHENIX	refinement
HKL-3000	data scaling
PHASER	phasing

Structure Validation

Entry History 

Deposition Data

• Deposited Date: 2011-11-07 
• Released Date: 2011-11-30 
• Deposition Author(s): Lee, S.G., Kim, Y., Alpert, T.D., Nagata, A., Jez, J.M.

Revision History 

• Version 1.0: 2011-11-30
  Type: Initial release
• Version 1.1: 2011-12-07
  Type: Atomic model, Other
• Version 1.2: 2012-03-21
  Type: Database references