%A Cheng Zhu, Changsheng Zhang, Huanhuan Liang, Luhua Lai
%T Engineering a zinc binding site into the de novo designed protein DS119 with a βαβ structure
%0 Journal Article
%D 2011
%J Protein Cell
%J Protein & Cell
%@ 1674-800X
%R 10.1007/s13238-011-1121-3
%P 1006-1013
%V 2
%N 12
%U {https://journal.hep.com.cn/pac/EN/10.1007/s13238-011-1121-3
%8 2011-12-01
%X
Functional proteins designed de novo have potential application in chemical engineering, agriculture and healthcare. Metal binding sites are commonly used to incorporate functions. Based on a de novo designed protein DS119 with a βαβ structure, we have computationally engineered zinc binding sites into it using a home-made searching program. Seven out of the eight designed sequences tested were shown to bind Zn2+ with micromolar affinity, and one of them bound Zn2+ with 1:1 stoichiometry. This is the first time that metalloproteins with an α, β mixed structure have been designed from scratch.