Conformational behavior of nucleotide-sugar in solution: Molecular dynamics and NMR study of solvated uridine diphosphate-glucose in the presence of monovalent cations
P. Petrova et al., Conformational behavior of nucleotide-sugar in solution: Molecular dynamics and NMR study of solvated uridine diphosphate-glucose in the presence of monovalent cations, BIOPOLYMERS, 58(7), 2001, pp. 617-635
The nucleotide-sugars are metabolites of primary importance in the biosynth
esis of polysaccharides and glycoconjugates since they serve as sugar donor
s in the reactions of glycosyltransferases, enzymes that displays a high sp
ecificity Sor both donors and acceptors. In order to determine the conforma
tional behavior of uridinediphosphoglucose in dilute aqueous solution that
includes a physiologically relevant concentration of salt, parallel NMR and
molecular modeling investigations have been conducted Nine molecular dynam
ics trajectories of 3 ns each were calculated in presence of explicit water
and monovalent cations with the use of the AMBER force field with recently
developed energy parameters for nucleotide-sugars (P. Petrova, J. Koca, an
d A. Imberty: Journal of American Chemical Society, 1999, vol. 121, pp. 553
5-5547). Theoretical nuclear Overhauser effect data were calculated from th
ese simulations using a model-free approach that rakes into account interna
l motions. Comparison of theoretical and experimental data gives excellent
agreement for the region surrounding the glucose-phosphate linkage includin
g the pyrophosphate linkage itself: Less satisfactory agreement is obtained
for the ribose ring and the base orientations, On the whole, both NMR and
molecular dynamics simulations predict the molecule to be flexible, and to
visit a large number of conformations while maintaining an extended overall
shape. (C) 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.