Levy D, Chami M, Rigaud J L
Institut Curie, Section de Recherche, UMR-CNRS 168 and LRC-CEA 8, 11 Rue Pierre et Marie Curie, 75231 Cedex 05, Paris, France.
FEBS Lett. 2001 Aug 31;504(3):187-93. doi: 10.1016/s0014-5793(01)02748-x.
Due to the difficulty to crystallize membrane proteins, there is a considerable interest to intensify research topics aimed at developing new methods of crystallization. In this context, the lipid layer crystallization at the air/water interface, used so far for soluble proteins, has been recently adapted successfully to produce two-dimensional (2D) crystals of membrane proteins, amenable to structural analysis by electron crystallography. Besides to represent a new alternative strategy, this approach gains the advantage to decrease significantly the amount of material needed in incubation trials, thus opening the field of crystallization to those membrane proteins difficult to surexpress and/or purify. The systematic studies that have been performed on different classes of membrane proteins are reviewed and the physico-chemical processes that lead to the production of 2D crystals are addressed. The different drawbacks, advantages and perspectives of this new strategy for providing structural information on membrane proteins are discussed.
由于膜蛋白难以结晶，人们对加强旨在开发新结晶方法的研究课题有着浓厚兴趣。在这种背景下，迄今为止用于可溶性蛋白质的气/水界面脂质层结晶法最近已成功应用于制备膜蛋白的二维（2D）晶体，便于通过电子晶体学进行结构分析。除了代表一种新的替代策略外，这种方法的优势在于能显著减少孵育试验所需的材料量，从而为那些难以过量表达和/或纯化的膜蛋白开启了结晶领域的大门。本文综述了对不同类膜蛋白进行的系统研究，并探讨了导致二维晶体产生的物理化学过程。讨论了这种为膜蛋白提供结构信息的新策略的不同缺点、优点和前景。
