Previous analyses of limited proteolytic sites within native, folded protein structures have shown that a significant conformational change is required in order to facilitate binding into the active site of the attacking proteinase. For the serine proteinases, the optimum conformation to match the proteinase binding-site geometry has been well characterized crystallographically by the conserved main-chain geometry of the reactive site loops of their protein inhibitors. A good substrate must adopt a conformation very similar to this "target" main-chain conformation prior to cleavage. Using a "loop-closure" modeling approach, we have tested the ability of a set of trypticlimited proteolytic sites to achieve this target conformation and further tested their suitability for cleavage. The results show that in most cases, significant changes in the conformation of at least 12 residues are required. All the putative tryptic cleavage sites in 1 protein, elastase, were also modeled and tested to compare the results to the actual nicksite in that protein. These results strongly suggest that large local motions proximate to the scissile bond are required for proteolysis, and it is this ability to unfold locally without perturbing the overall protein conformation that is the prime determinant for limited proteolysis.

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Solid-state magic-angle-spinning (MAS) NMR of proteins has undergone many rapid methodological developments in recent years, enabling detailed studies of protein structure, function and dynamics. Software development, however, has not kept pace with these advances and data analysis is mostly performed using tools developed for solution NMR which do not directly address solid-state specific issues. Here we present additions to the CcpNmr Analysis software package which enable easier identification of spinning side bands, straightforward analysis of double quantum spectra, automatic consideration of non-uniform labelling schemes, as well as extension of other existing features to the needs of solid-state MAS data. To underpin this, we have updated and extended the CCPN data model and experiment descriptions to include transfer types and nomenclature appropriate for solid-state NMR experiments, as well as a set of experiment prototypes covering the experiments commonly employed by solid-sate MAS protein NMR spectroscopists. This work not only improves solid-state MAS NMR data analysis but provides a platform for anyone who uses the CCPN data model for programming, data transfer, or data archival involving solid-state MAS NMR data.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s10858-011-9569-2) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

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