Identification of Promiscuous Ene-Reductase Activity by Mining Structural Databases Using Active Site Constellations.
Steinkellner, G., Gruber, C.C., Pavkov-Keller, T., Binter, A., Steiner, K., Winkler, C., Lyskowski, A., Schwamberger, O., Oberer, M., Schwab, H., Faber, K., Macheroux, P., Gruber, K.(2014) Nat Commun 5: 4150
- PubMed: 24954722 
- DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms5150
- Primary Citation of Related Structures:  
3ZOC, 3ZOD, 3ZOE, 3ZOF, 3ZOG, 3ZOH - PubMed Abstract: 
The exploitation of catalytic promiscuity and the application of de novo design have recently opened the access to novel, non-natural enzymatic activities. Here we describe a structural bioinformatic method for predicting catalytic activities of enzymes based on three-dimensional constellations of functional groups in active sites ('catalophores'). As a proof-of-concept we identify two enzymes with predicted promiscuous ene-reductase activity (reduction of activated C-C double bonds) and compare them with known ene-reductases, that is, members of the Old Yellow Enzyme family. Despite completely different amino acid sequences, overall structures and protein folds, high-resolution crystal structures reveal equivalent binding modes of typical Old Yellow Enzyme substrates and ligands. Biochemical and biocatalytic data show that the two enzymes indeed possess ene-reductase activity and reveal an inverted stereopreference compared with Old Yellow Enzymes for some substrates. This method could thus be a tool for the identification of viable starting points for the development and engineering of novel biocatalysts.
Organizational Affiliation: 
1] ACIB GmbH, Petersgasse 14, 8010 Graz, Austria [2].