Characterization of diverse internal binding specificities of PDZ domains by yeast two-hybrid screening of a special peptide library

PLoS One. 2014 Feb 4;9(2):e88286. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0088286. eCollection 2014.

Abstract

Protein-protein interactions (PPIs) are essential events to play important roles in a series of biological processes. There are probably more ways of PPIs than we currently realized. Structural and functional investigations of weak PPIs have lagged behind those of strong PPIs due to technical difficulties. Weak PPIs are often short-lived, which may result in more dynamic signals with important biological roles within and/or between cells. For example, the characteristics of PSD-95/Dlg/ZO-1 (PDZ) domain binding to internal sequences, which are primarily weak interactions, have not yet been systematically explored. In the present study, we constructed a nearly random octapeptide yeast two-hybrid library. A total of 24 PDZ domains were used as baits for screening the library. Fourteen of these domains were able to bind internal PDZ-domain binding motifs (PBMs), and PBMs screened for nine PDZ domains exhibited strong preferences. Among 11 PDZ domains that have not been reported their internal PBM binding ability, six were confirmed to bind internal PBMs. The first PDZ domain of LNX2, which has not been reported to bind C-terminal PBMs, was found to bind internal PBMs. These results suggest that the internal PBMs binding ability of PDZ domains may have been underestimated. The data provided diverse internal binding properties for several PDZ domains that may help identify their novel binding partners.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Amino Acid Sequence
  • Humans
  • Molecular Sequence Data
  • PDZ Domains / physiology*
  • Peptide Library
  • Peptides / metabolism*
  • Protein Binding / physiology*
  • Protein Interaction Domains and Motifs / physiology*
  • Proteins / metabolism*
  • Two-Hybrid System Techniques

Substances

  • Peptide Library
  • Peptides
  • Proteins

Grants and funding

This work was supported by the National Basic Research Program of China (2012CB517606, 2013CB530805), 111 Project (B08007), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (31200614) and the Beijing Natural Science Foundation (5132028). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.