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The majority of proteins targeted to the peroxisomal lumen contain a C-terminal peroxisomal targeting signal-1 (PTS1) that is bound by the peroxin Pex5p. The PTS1 is generally regarded as a C-terminal tripeptide that adheres to the consensus (S/A/C)(K/R/H)(L/M). Previously, we studied the binding affinity of peptides of the form YQX(-3)X(-2)X(-1) to the peptide-binding domain of human Pex5p (referred to as Pex5p-C). Optimal affinity was found for YQSKL, which bound with an affinity of 200 +/- 40 nM. To extend this work, we investigated the properties of a peptide containing the last 9 residues of acyl-CoA oxidase (RHYLKPLQSKL) and discovered that it binds to Pex5p-C with a dissociation constant of 1.4 +/- 0.4 nM, 180 times tighter than YQSKL. Further analysis revealed that the enhanced affinity is primarily due to the presence of leucine in the (-5) position. In addition, a peptide corresponding to the luciferase C-terminus (YKGGKSKL) was found to bind Pex5p-C about 20 times tighter than YQSKL. The majority of this effect results from having lysine in position (-4). Catalase contains a noncanonical PTS1 (-AREKANL). The affinity of YQANL was found to be 3600 +/- 400 nM. This relatively weak binding is consistent with previous unsuccessful attempts to direct chloramphenicol acetyltransferase to the peroxisome by fusing -ANL to its C-terminus (-GGA-ANL). The peptides YKANL, YEKANL, YREKANL, and YAREKANL all bound Pex5p-C with higher affinities than did YQANL, but the affinities are still lower than peptides that correspond to functional targeting signals in other contexts. Because both catalase and Pex5p are tetramers (as opposed to the monomeric Pex5p-C and the peptides used in our studies), multidentate effects on binding affinity between Pex5p and other oligomeric proteins should be considered. Our study provides direct thermodynamic data revealing that peptide binding to Pex5p-C binding is favored by lysine in the (-4) position and leucine in the (-5) position. Our results suggest that peptides or proteins with optimized residues in the (-4) and/or (-5) positions can bind to Pex5p with affinities that are at least two orders of magnitude greater than that of YQSKL, and that this stabilization can compensates for otherwise weakly binding PTS1s., (Copyright 2004 Wiley-Liss, Inc.)

The three-dimensional structure of a protein can greatly illuminate the relationship between its sequence and its function. However, in the absence of a set of experimentally derived coordinates, one often seeks a model of the protein of interest to guide future study. We describe the combined utilization of orthologous sequence information along with knowledge of the related structural fold to model the interaction between PEX5 and its ligand, the peroxisomal targeting signal-1 (PTS1). With this model, we are able to identify residues within PEX5 that appear to be important for peptide recognition, as well as explain some of the sequence requirements of the PTS1. Specifically, our model highlights four asparagine residues as important for ligand backbone atom recognition, which, along with previously observed examples, suggests this as a general mechanism for the binding of extended polypeptides.