Blobel C P, Wolfsberg T G, Turck C W, Myles D G, Primakoff P, White J M
Department of Pharmacology, University of California San Francisco.
Nature. 1992 Mar 19;356(6366):248-52. doi: 10.1038/356248a0.
The union of sperm and egg is a special membrane fusion event that gives a signal to begin development. We have hypothesized that proteins mediating cell-cell fusion events resemble viral fusion proteins and have shown that PH-30, a sperm surface protein involved in sperm-egg fusion, shares biochemical characteristics with viral fusion proteins. We report here the complementary DNA and deduced amino-acid sequences of the mature alpha and beta subunits of PH-30. Both are type-I integral membrane glycoproteins. The alpha subunit contains a putative fusion peptide typical of viral fusion proteins and the beta subunit contains a domain related to a family of soluble integrin ligands found in snake venoms. Thus, the PH-30 alpha/beta complex resembles many viral fusion proteins in both its membrane topology and its predicted binding and fusion functions.
精子与卵子的结合是一种特殊的膜融合事件，它会发出开始发育的信号。我们推测介导细胞间融合事件的蛋白质类似于病毒融合蛋白，并已表明参与精卵融合的精子表面蛋白PH-30与病毒融合蛋白具有共同的生化特性。我们在此报告PH-30成熟α亚基和β亚基的互补DNA及推导的氨基酸序列。两者均为I型整合膜糖蛋白。α亚基含有病毒融合蛋白特有的推定融合肽，β亚基含有与蛇毒中发现的可溶性整合素配体家族相关的结构域。因此，PH-30α/β复合物在膜拓扑结构及其预测的结合和融合功能方面类似于许多病毒融合蛋白。
