Department of Chemistry, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA 19104, USA.
Structure. 2012 Jan 11;20(1):5-14. doi: 10.1016/j.str.2011.12.003.
Membrane proteins are involved in a wide variety of cellular processes, and are typically part of the first interaction a cell has with extracellular molecules. As a result, these proteins comprise a majority of known drug targets. Membrane proteins are among the most difficult proteins to obtain and characterize, and a structure-based understanding of their properties can be difficult to elucidate. Notwithstanding, the design of membrane proteins can provide stringent tests of our understanding of these crucial biological systems, as well as introduce novel or targeted functionalities. Computational design methods have been particularly helpful in addressing these issues, and this review discusses recent studies that tailor membrane proteins to display specific structures or functions and examines how redesigned membrane proteins are being used to facilitate structural and functional studies.
膜蛋白参与多种细胞过程，通常是细胞与细胞外分子的首次相互作用的一部分。因此，这些蛋白质构成了大多数已知药物靶点。膜蛋白是最难获得和表征的蛋白质之一，其性质的结构基础理解可能很难阐明。尽管如此，膜蛋白的设计可以为我们对这些关键生物系统的理解提供严格的测试，并引入新的或有针对性的功能。计算设计方法在解决这些问题方面特别有帮助，本综述讨论了最近将膜蛋白设计成具有特定结构或功能的研究，并探讨了重新设计的膜蛋白如何用于促进结构和功能研究。
