{PDOC00128} {PS00141; ASP_PROTEASE} {PS50175; ASP_PROT_RETROV} {PS51767; PEPTIDASE_A1} {BEGIN} ****************************************************************** * Eukaryotic and viral aspartyl proteases signature and profiles * ****************************************************************** Aspartyl proteases (APs), also known as acid proteases, (EC 3.4.23.-) are a widely distributed family of proteolytic enzymes [1,2,3,4,5] known to exist in vertebrates, fungi, plants, retroviruses and some plant viruses. APs use an Asp dyad to hydrolyze peptide bonds. APs found in eukaryotic cells are alpha/beta monomers composed of two asymmetric lobes, with the catalytic Asp dyad located at the lobe interface and a flap made up of a beta-hairpin covering the peptide substrates ("pepsin- like" proteases) (see ). Each of the lobes provides a catalytic Asp residue, positioned within the hallmark motif Asp-Thr/Set-Gly, to the active site. Eukaryotic APs form peptidase family A1 of clan AA [E1]. Currently known eukaryotic APs are: - Vertebrate gastric pepsins A and C (also known as gastricsin). - Vertebrate chymosin (rennin), involved in digestion and used for making cheese. - Vertebrate lysosomal cathepsins D (EC 3.4.23.5) and E (EC 3.4.23.34). - Mammalian renin (EC 3.4.23.15) whose function is to generate angiotensin I from angiotensinogen in the plasma. - Fungal proteases such as aspergillopepsin A (EC 3.4.23.18), candidapepsin (EC 3.4.23.24), mucoropepsin (EC 3.4.23.23) (mucor rennin), endothiapepsin (EC 3.4.23.22), polyporopepsin (EC 3.4.23.29), and rhizopuspepsin (EC 3.4.23.21). - Yeast saccharopepsin (EC 3.4.23.25) (proteinase A) (gene PEP4). PEP4 is implicated in posttranslational regulation of vacuolar hydrolases. - Yeast barrierpepsin (EC 3.4.23.35) (gene BAR1); a protease that cleaves alpha-factor and thus acts as an antagonist of the mating pheromone. - Fission yeast sxa1 which is involved in degrading or processing the mating pheromones. Most retroviruses and some plant viruses, such as badnaviruses, encode for APs which are beta homodimers (see ), where the aspartates are located on two loops at the monomer interface and where two beta-hairpins cover the active site. In most retroviruses, the protease is encoded as a segment of a polyprotein which is cleaved during the maturation process of the virus. It is generally part of the pol polyprotein and, more rarely, of the gag polyprotein. Retroviral APs form peptidase family A2 of clan AA [E2]. Despite the structural differences and the low sequence identity, it is believed that the eukaryotic and retroviral protease families are evolutionarily related since, in both folds, the cleavage site loops are homologous, the Asp dyad is located at an interface region, and the viral subunits are structurally similar to the N-terminal lobes of the eukaryotic family enzymes. Conservation of the sequence around the two aspartates of eukaryotic APs and around the single active site of the viral proteases allows us to develop a single signature pattern for both groups of protease. A profile was developed to specifically detect viral aspartyl proteases, which are missed by the pattern. Another profile is directed against the eukaryotic peptidase family A1 catalytic domain. -Consensus pattern: [LIVMFGAC]-[LIVMTADN]-[LIVFSA]-D-[ST]-G-[STAV]-[STAPDENQ]- {GQ}-[LIVMFSTNC]-{EGK}-[LIVMFGTA] [D is the active site residue] -Sequences known to belong to this class detected by the pattern: ALL. -Other sequence(s) detected in Swiss-Prot: 37. -Sequences known to belong to this class detected by the profile: ALL viral- type proteases. -Other sequence(s) detected in Swiss-Prot: 3. -Sequences known to belong to this class detected by the profile: ALL family A1 proteases. -Other sequence(s) detected in Swiss-Prot: NONE. -Note: These proteins belong to families A1 and A2 in the classification of peptidases [6,E3]. -Last update: July 2015 / Text revised; profile added. [ 1] Foltmann B. "Gastric proteinases--structure, function, evolution and mechanism of action." Essays Biochem. 17:52-84(1981). PubMed=6795036 [ 2] Davies D.R. "The structure and function of the aspartic proteinases." Annu. Rev. Biophys. Biophys. Chem. 19:189-215(1990). PubMed=2194475 [ 3] Rao J.K.M., Erickson J.W., Wlodawer A. "Structural and evolutionary relationships between retroviral and eucaryotic aspartic proteinases." Biochemistry 30:4663-4671(1991). PubMed=1851433 [ 4] Cascella M., Micheletti C., Rothlisberger U., Carloni P. "Evolutionarily conserved functional mechanics across pepsin-like and retroviral aspartic proteases." J. Am. Chem. Soc. 127:3734-3742(2005). PubMed=15771507; DOI=10.1021/ja044608+ [ 5] Revuelta M.V., van Kan J.A.L., Kay J., ten Have A. "Extensive expansion of A1 family aspartic proteinases in fungi revealed by evolutionary analyses of 107 complete eukaryotic proteomes." Genome Biol. Evol. 6:1480-1494(2014). PubMed=24869856; DOI=10.1093/gbe/evu110 [ 6] Rawlings N.D., Barrett A.J. "Families of aspartic peptidases, and those of unknown catalytic mechanism." Methods Enzymol. 248:105-120(1995). PubMed=7674916 [E1] https://www.ebi.ac.uk/merops/cgi-bin/famsum?family=a1 [E2] https://www.ebi.ac.uk/merops/cgi-bin/famsum?family=a2 [E3] https://www.uniprot.org/docs/peptidas -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- PROSITE is copyrighted by the SIB Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics and distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) License, see https://prosite.expasy.org/prosite_license.html -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- {END}