This subproject is one of many research subprojects utilizing the resources provided by a Center grant funded by NIH/NCRR. The subproject and investigator (PI) may have received primary funding from another NIH source, and thus could be represented in other CRISP entries. The institution listed is for the Center, which is not necessarily the institution for the investigator. We have collected crystal data from both the head and tail regions of scallop myosin. Following our recent study on the high-resolution crystal structure of the actin-detached, internally-uncoupled state of the scallop myosin head (S1) (Himmel, et al., in preparation;reported in our CHESS Progress Report of 2001), we have now obtained a 2.6A resolution structure of S1 in the pre-power stroke or primed conformation (Gourinath, et al., in preparation). Comparison of these two structures, which differ greatly in subdomain interactions, will provide key information on the flexibility of linkages in different states of the contractile cycle. Until now, there has not been a detailed structure reported for any part of the tail of myosin. Using data collected to 2.6A resolution at CHESS, we are determining the structure of a 50-residue-long segment of the scallop myosin tail, located adjacent to the myosin head. This region of the tail is critical for the regulatory properties of the myosin molecule (Li et al., in preparation). Based on data collected at CHESS during the past few years, we have also published reports on crystal structures of key fragments of tropomyosin and fibrinogen. Following our work on an N-terminal fragment of tropomyosin (Brown et al., 2001), we have now established the structure of a 31-residue C-terminal segment of striated-muscle tropomyosin, which shows an unusual splayed conformation. These results reveal a specific recognition site for troponin T and clarify the physical basis for the unique regulatory mechanism of striated muscles (Li et al., PNAS, in press). In our efforts to understand the molecular basis of blood clotting, we have also pursued crystal structures of fibrinogen. We previously reported the 4A structure of the 285 kDa backbone of bovine fibrinogen (Brown et al., 2000), and have now achieved a 1.4A resolution structure of the central domain of the molecule (Madrazo et al., 2001). This structure has a remarkable dimeric interface, which could not previously be visualized. Taken together, these results have improved our understanding of the assembly of the molecule into the fibrinogen clot.
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