Interactions of ironasulfur clusters with small peptides: Insights into early evolution

Favoring the stability of ironasulfur clusters in hydrothermal vents could have been important for the origin of life. It has been postulated that small anesta peptides with lengths between 3 and 6 residues could have been important to stabilize early ironasulfur clusters. We present theoretical cal...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Computational biology and chemistry 2012-12, Vol.41, p.58-61
Main Authors: Hong Enriquez, Rolando P, Do, Trang N
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Affinity
Biology
Clusters
Evolution
Mathematical analysis
Peptides
Residues
Vents
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Summary:Favoring the stability of ironasulfur clusters in hydrothermal vents could have been important for the origin of life. It has been postulated that small anesta peptides with lengths between 3 and 6 residues could have been important to stabilize early ironasulfur clusters. We present theoretical calculations exploring the sequence and conformational spaces of short peptides able to bind with high affinity the ironasulfur cluster Fe4S4. Our results indicate that it is unlikely to form stable complexes between Fe4S4 and small peptides at the core of hydrothermal vents. The formation of these complexes is instead favored for peptides of at least 8 residues as they diffused together with the Fe4S4 clusters toward lower temperature regions within the vent-associated temperature gradients.
ISSN:1476-9271
DOI:10.1016/j.compbiolchem.2012.10.006