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Copper resistance is a key virulence trait of the uropathogen Proteus mirabilis. Here we show that P. mirabilis ScsC (PmScsC) contributes to this defence mechanism by enabling swarming in the presence of copper. We also demonstrate that PmScsC is a thioredoxin-like disulfide isomerase but, unlike other characterized proteins in this family, it is trimeric. PmScsC trimerization and its active site cysteine are required for wild-type swarming activity in the presence of copper. Moreover, PmScsC exhibits unprecedented motion as a consequence of a shape-shifting motif linking the catalytic and trimerization domains. The linker accesses strand, loop and helical conformations enabling the sampling of an enormous folding landscape by the catalytic domains. Mutation of the shape-shifting motif abolishes disulfide isomerase activity, as does removal of the trimerization domain, showing that both features are essential to foldase function. More broadly, the shape-shifter peptide has the potential for ‘plug and play’ application in protein engineering., Bacterial disulfide isomerases shuffle incorrect disulfide bonds. Here, the authors structurally characterize the disulfide isomerase ScsC from Proteus mirabilis and identify a functionally important shape-shifting motif that allows ScsC to adopt a diverse range of conformations and enable swarming in the presence of copper stress.

Optimising membrane protein production yields in Escherichia coli can be time- and resource-consuming. Here, we present a simple and effective Membrane protein Single shot amplification recipe: MemStar. This one-shot amplification recipe is based on the E. coli strain Lemo21(DE3), the PASM-5052 auto-induction medium and, contradictorily, an IPTG induction step. Using MemStar, production yields for most bacterial membrane proteins tested were improved to reach an average of 5mgL−1 per OD600 unit, which is significantly higher than yields obtained with other common production strategies. With MemStar, we have been able to obtain new structural information for several transporters, including the sodium/proton antiporter NapA.

Bacterial response regulators (RRs) can regulate the expression of genes that confer antibiotic resistance; they contain a receiver and an effector domain and their ability to bind DNA is based on the dimerization state. This is triggered by phosphorylation of the receiver domain by a kinase. However, even in the absence of phosphorylation RRs can exist in equilibrium between monomers and dimers with phosphorylation shifting the equilibrium toward the dimer form. We have determined the crystal structure of the unphosphorylated dimeric BaeR from Escherichia coli. The dimer interface is formed by a domain swap at the receiver domain. In comparison with the unphosphorylated dimeric PhoP from Mycobacterium tuberculosis, BaeR displays an asymmetry of the effector domains.

TehB is an S-adenosyl-L-methionine (SAM) dependent methyltransferase that detoxifies tellurite in bacteria. The Escherichia coli TehB protein was purified and crystallized in the presence of both SAM and sinefungin. The TehB-SAM and TehB-sinefungin crystals both diffracted X-rays to 1.9 Å resolution. The TehB-SAM crystals belonged to space group C2, with unit-cell parameters a = 60.0, b = 56.1, c = 130.6 Å, β = 97.9°. The TehB-sinefungin crystals belonged to space group P2(1), with unit-cell parameters a = 59.1, b = 55.5, c = 129.7 Å, β = 95.9°.

The ATP binding cassette (ABC) transporters form one of the largest protein superfamilies. They use the energy of ATP hydrolysis to transport chemically diverse ligands across membranes. An alternating access mechanism in which the transporter switches between inward- and outward-facing conformations has been proposed to describe the translocation process. One of the main open questions in this process is the degree of opening of the transporter at different stages of the transport cycle, as crystal structures and biochemical data have suggested a wide range of distances between nucleotide binding domains. Recently, the crystal structure of McjD, an antibacterial peptide ABC transporter from Escherichia coli, revealed a new occluded intermediate state of the transport cycle. The transmembrane domain is closed on both sides of the membrane, forming a cavity that can accommodate its ligand, MccJ25, a lasso peptide of 21 amino acids. In this work, we investigate the degree of opening of the transmembrane cavity required for ligand translocation. By means of steered molecular dynamics simulations, the ligand was pulled from the internal cavity to the extracellular side. This resulted in an outward-facing state. Comparison with existing outward-facing crystal structures shows a smaller degree of opening in the simulations, suggesting that the large conformational changes in some crystal structures may not be necessary even for a large substrate like MccJ25.