SELF-COMPARTMENTALIZING PROTEASES

Among the hundreds of proteases characterized so far, most of which ar e monomeric or dimeric, there is a small group that form compartments through self-association and that segregate their proteolytic active s ites to the interior of these compartments, Although few in number, th ey represent the main agents of intracellular protein breakdown. They belong to different hydrolase families but have converged towards the same barrel-shaped architecture. Frequently, they are coupled to chape rone-like ATPases of similar quaternary structure that regulate the ac cess to the proteolytic compartments and appear to have been recruited from the same branch of P-loop NTPases.