Structural propensities of human ubiquitination sites: accessibility, centrality and local conformation

PLoS One. 2013 Dec 11;8(12):e83167. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0083167. eCollection 2013.

Abstract

The existence and function of most proteins in the human proteome are regulated by the ubiquitination process. To date, tens of thousands human ubiquitination sites have been identified from high-throughput proteomic studies. However, the mechanism of ubiquitination site selection remains elusive because of the complicated sequence pattern flanking the ubiquitination sites. In this study, we perform a systematic analysis of 1,330 ubiquitination sites in 505 protein structures and quantify the significantly high accessibility and unexpectedly high centrality of human ubiquitination sites. Further analysis suggests that the higher centrality of ubiquitination sites is associated with the multi-functionality of ubiquitination sites, among which protein-protein interaction sites are common targets of ubiquitination. Moreover, we demonstrate that ubiquitination sites are flanked by residues with non-random local conformation. Finally, we provide quantitative and unambiguous evidence that most of the structural propensities contain specific information about ubiquitination site selection that is not represented by the sequence pattern. Therefore, the hypothesis about the structural level of the ubiquitination site selection mechanism has been substantially approved.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Humans
  • Proteome / genetics*
  • Proteome / metabolism
  • Sequence Analysis, Protein*
  • Structure-Activity Relationship
  • Ubiquitination / genetics

Substances

  • Proteome

Grants and funding

This work was partially supported by the National Key Basic Research Program of China (2009CB918802)and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (31070259 and 61202167). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.