The crystal structure of the ternary complex of staphylococcal nuclease, Ca2+ and the inhibitor pdTp, refined at 1.65 Å

Abstract

The structure of a complex of staphylococcal nuclease with Ca 2+ and deoxythymidine 3′,5′‐biophosphate (pdTp) has been refined by stereochemically restrained leastsquares minimization to a crystallographic R value of 0.161 at Å resolution. The estimated root‐mean‐square (rms) error in the coordinates in 0.16 Å. The final model comprises 1082 protein atoms, onecalcium ion, the pdTp molecule, and 82 protein atoms, onecalcium ion, the pdTp molecule, and 82 solvent water molecules;it displays an rms deviation from ideality of 0.017 Å for bond distances and 1.8° for bond angles. The mean distance between corresponding α carbons in the refined and unrefined structures is 0.6 Å we observe small but significant differences between the refined and unrefined models in the turn between residues 27 and 30, the loop between residues 44 and 50, the first helix, and the extended strand between residues 112 and 117 which forms part of the active site binding pocket. The details of the calcium liganding and solvent structure in the activesite are clearly shown in the final electron density map. The structure ofthe catalytic site is consistent with mechanism that has been proposed for this enzyme. However, we note that two lysines from a symmetry‐related molecule in the crystal lattice may play an important role in determining the geometry of inhibitor binding, and that only one of the two required calcium ions is observed in the crystal structure; thus, caution is advised in extrapolating from the structure of the complex of enzyme and inhibitor to that enzyme and substrate.