The crystal structure of a TIR domain from Arabidopsis thaliana reveals a conserved helical region unique to plants.

Plants use a highly evolved immune system to exhibit defense response against microbial infections. The plant TIR domain, together with the nucleotide-binding (NB) domain and/or a LRR region, forms a type of molecule, named resistance (R) proteins, that interact with microbial effector proteins and elicit hypersensitive responses against infection. Here, we report the first crystal structure of a plant TIR domain from Arabidopsis thaliana (AtTIR) solved at a resolution of 2.

Preliminary structural studies on the leucine-zipper homology region of the human protein Bap31.

B-cell receptor-associated protein 31 (Bap31) is an integral membrane protein located in the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) that participates in the transport and quality control of membrane proteins and plays a role in determining cell sensitivity to ER stress and apoptosis. Its cytoplasmic region contains two target sites for caspase cleavage in certain apoptotic pathways. Here, the subcloning, expression, purification and crystallization of the Homo sapiens Bap31 leucine-zipper C-terminal fragment, which spans residues Gly160-Glu246, are reported.

Characterization of a TIR-like protein from Paracoccus denitrificans.

Based on protein sequence homology searches, we found a conserved open reading frame within the genome of several human pathogenic bacteria showing a resemblance to the mammalian TIR domain. We cloned, expressed, and characterized the corresponding gene product from Paracoccus denitrificans using several biophysical techniques. The protein consists of two independently folded domains.

Either the carboxyl- or the amino-terminal region of the human ecto-ATPase (E-NTPDase 2) confers detergent and temperature sensitivity to the chicken ecto-ATP-diphosphohydrolase (E-NTPDase 8).

Human ecto-ATPase (E-NTPDase 2) and chicken ecto-ATP-diphosphohydrolase (E-NTPDase 8) are cell surface nucleotidases with two transmembranous domains, one each at the N- and C-termini. Hydrolysis of substrates occurs in active sites residing in their extracellular domains. Human ecto-ATPase activity is decreased by NP-40 and at temperatures higher than 37 degrees C.