Rawlings Neil D, Tolle Dominic P, Barrett Alan J
The Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, Wellcome Trust Genome Campus, Hinxton, Cambridgeshire CB10 1SA, UK.
Biochem J. 2004 Mar 15;378(Pt 3):705-16. doi: 10.1042/BJ20031825.
The proteins that inhibit peptidases are of great importance in medicine and biotechnology, but there has never been a comprehensive system of classification for them. Some of the terminology currently in use is potentially confusing. In the hope of facilitating the exchange, storage and retrieval of information about this important group of proteins, we now describe a system wherein the inhibitor units of the peptidase inhibitors are assigned to 48 families on the basis of similarities detectable at the level of amino acid sequence. Then, on the basis of three-dimensional structures, 31 of the families are assigned to 26 clans. A simple system of nomenclature is introduced for reference to each clan, family and inhibitor. We briefly discuss the specificities and mechanisms of the interactions of the inhibitors in the various families with their target enzymes. The system of families and clans of inhibitors described has been implemented in the MEROPS peptidase database (http://merops.sanger.ac.uk/), and this will provide a mechanism for updating it as new information becomes available.
抑制肽酶的蛋白质在医学和生物技术领域具有重要意义，但此前从未有过针对它们的全面分类系统。目前使用的一些术语可能会造成混淆。为了便于交流、存储和检索有关这一重要蛋白质组的信息，我们现在描述一种系统，其中肽酶抑制剂的抑制单元根据氨基酸序列水平上可检测到的相似性被归为48个家族。然后，基于三维结构，其中31个家族被归为26个族。引入了一个简单的命名系统，用于指代每个族、家族和抑制剂。我们简要讨论了各个家族中抑制剂与其靶酶相互作用的特异性和机制。所描述的抑制剂家族和族系统已在MEROPS肽酶数据库（http://merops.sanger.ac.uk/）中实施，这将为新信息出现时更新该系统提供一种机制。
