Home ScanProsite ProRule Documents Downloads Links Funding
	PROSITE documentation PDOC00190 [for PROSITE entry PS00216]

Sugar transport proteins signatures

In mammalian cells the uptake of glucose is mediated by a family of closely related transport proteins which are called the glucose transporters [1,2,3]. At least seven of these transporters are currently known to exist (in Human they are encoded by the GLUT1 to GLUT7 genes).

These integral membrane proteins are predicted to comprise twelve membrane spanning domains. The glucose transporters show sequence similarities [4,5] with a number of other sugar or metabolite transport proteins listed below (references are only provided for recently determined sequences).

• Escherichia coli arabinose-proton symport (araE).
• Escherichia coli galactose-proton symport (galP).
• Escherichia coli and Klebsiella pneumoniae citrate-proton symport (also known as citrate utilization determinant) (gene cit).
• Escherichia coli α-ketoglutarate permease (gene kgtP).
• Escherichia coli proline/βine transporter (gene proP) [6].
• Escherichia coli xylose-proton symport (xylE).
• Zymomonas mobilis glucose facilitated diffusion protein (gene glf).
• Yeast high and low affinity glucose transport proteins (genes SNF3, HXT1 to HXT14).
• Yeast galactose transporter (gene GAL2).
• Yeast maltose permeases (genes MAL3T and MAL6T).
• Yeast myo-inositol transporters (genes ITR1 and ITR2).
• Yeast carboxylic acid transporter protein homolog JEN1.
• Yeast inorganic phosphate transporter (gene PHO84).
• Kluyveromyces lactis lactose permease (gene LAC12).
• Neurospora crassa quinate transporter (gene Qa-y), and Emericella nidulans quinate permease (gene qutD).
• Chlorella hexose carrier (gene HUP1).
• Arabidopsis thaliana glucose transporter (gene STP1).
• Spinach sucrose transporter.
• Leishmania donovani transporters D1 and D2.
• Leishmania enriettii probable transport protein (LTP).
• Yeast hypothetical proteins YBR241c, YCR98c and YFL040w.
• Caenorhabditis elegans hypothetical protein ZK637.1.
• Escherichia coli hypothetical proteins yabE, ydjE and yhjE.
• Haemophilus influenzae hypothetical proteins HI0281 and HI0418.
• Bacillus subtilis hypothetical proteins yxbC and yxdF.

It has been suggested [4] that these transport proteins have evolved from the duplication of an ancestral protein with six transmembrane regions, this hypothesis is based on the conservation of two G-R-[KR] motifs. The first one is located between the second and third transmembrane domains and the second one between transmembrane domains 8 and 9.

We have developed two patterns to detect this family of proteins. The first pattern is based on the G-R-[KR] motif; but because this motif is too short to be specific to this family of proteins, we have derived a pattern from a larger region centered on the second copy of this motif. The second pattern is based on a number of conserved residues which are located at the end of the fourth transmembrane segment and in the short loop region between the fourth and fifth segments.

Last update:

April 2006 / Patterns revised.

PROSITE methods (with tools and information) covered by this documentation:

SUGAR_TRANSPORT_1, PS00216; Sugar transport proteins signature 1  (PATTERN)

• Consensus pattern:
  [LIVMSTAG]-[LIVMFSAG]-{SH}-{RDE}-[LIVMSA]-[DE]-{TD}-[LIVMFYWA]-G-R-[RK]-x(4,6)-[GSTA]
• Sequences in UniProtKB/Swiss-Prot known to belong to this class: 420
  • detected by PS00216: 280 (true positives)
  • undetected by PS00216: 140 (136 false negatives and 4 'partials')
• Other sequence(s) in UniProtKB/Swiss-Prot detected by PS00216:
  141 false positives and 27 unknowns.
• Retrieve an alignment of UniProtKB/Swiss-Prot true positive hits:
  Clustal format, color, condensed view  /  Clustal format, color  /  Clustal format, plain text  /  Fasta format
• Retrieve the sequence logo from the alignment
• Taxonomic distribution of all UniProtKB (Swiss-Prot + TrEMBL) entries matching PS00216
• Retrieve a list of all UniProtKB (Swiss-Prot + TrEMBL) entries matching PS00216
• Scan UniProtKB (Swiss-Prot and/or TrEMBL) entries against PS00216
• View ligand binding statistics of PS00216
• Matching PDB structures: 3BK1 3BK2 3T3N 3T3O ... [ALL]

SUGAR_TRANSPORT_2, PS00217; Sugar transport proteins signature 2  (PATTERN)

• Consensus pattern:
  [LIVMF]-x-G-[LIVMFA]-{V}-x-G-{KP}-x(7)-[LIFY]-x(2)-[EQ]-x(6)-[RK]
• Sequences in UniProtKB/Swiss-Prot known to belong to this class: 380
  • detected by PS00217: 239 (true positives)
  • undetected by PS00217: 141 (138 false negatives and 3 'partials')
• Other sequence(s) in UniProtKB/Swiss-Prot detected by PS00217:
  195 false positives and 2 unknowns.
• Retrieve an alignment of UniProtKB/Swiss-Prot true positive hits:
  Clustal format, color, condensed view  /  Clustal format, color  /  Clustal format, plain text  /  Fasta format
• Retrieve the sequence logo from the alignment
• Taxonomic distribution of all UniProtKB (Swiss-Prot + TrEMBL) entries matching PS00217
• Retrieve a list of all UniProtKB (Swiss-Prot + TrEMBL) entries matching PS00217
• Scan UniProtKB (Swiss-Prot and/or TrEMBL) entries against PS00217
• View ligand binding statistics of PS00217
• Matching PDB structures: 4GBY 4GBZ 4GC0 4JA3 ... [ALL]

1	Authors	Silverman M.
	Title	Structure and function of hexose transporters.
	Source	Annu. Rev. Biochem. 60:757-794(1991).
	PubMed ID	1883208
	DOI	10.1146/annurev.bi.60.070191.003545

2	Authors	Gould G.W., Bell G.I.
	Title	Facilitative glucose transporters: an expanding family.
	Source	Trends Biochem. Sci. 15:18-23(1990).
	PubMed ID	2180146

3	Authors	Baldwin S.A.
	Title	Mammalian passive glucose transporters: members of an ubiquitous family of active and passive transport proteins.
	Source	Biochim. Biophys. Acta 1154:17-49(1993).
	PubMed ID	8507645

4	Authors	Maiden M.C.J., Davis E.O., Baldwin S.A., Moore D.C.M., Henderson P.J.F.
	Title	Mammalian and bacterial sugar transport proteins are homologous.
	Source	Nature 325:641-643(1987).
	PubMed ID	3543693
	DOI	10.1038/325641a0

5	Authors	Henderson P.J.F.
	Source	Curr. Opin. Struct. Biol. 1:590-601(1991).

6	Authors	Culham D.E., Lasby B., Marangoni A.G., Milner J.L., Steer B.A., van Nues R.W., Wood J.M.
	Title	Isolation and sequencing of Escherichia coli gene proP reveals unusual structural features of the osmoregulatory proline/betaine transporter, ProP.
	Source	J. Mol. Biol. 229:268-276(1993).
	PubMed ID	8421314

PROSITE is copyright. It is produced by the SIB Swiss Institute Bioinformatics. There are no restrictions on its use by non-profit institutions as long as its content is in no way modified. Usage by and for commercial entities requires a license agreement. For information about the licensing scheme send an email to

Prosite License or see: prosite_license.html.


View entry in original PROSITE document format
View entry in raw text format (no links)