African Viper
Poly-His Tag Peptide Fragment Efficiently Binds Metal Ions and Is
Folded into an α‑Helical Structure
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Abstract
Snake
venoms are complex mixtures of toxic and often spectacularly biologically
active components. Some African vipers contain polyhistidine and polyglycine
peptides, which play a crucial role in the interaction with metal
ions during the inhibition of snake metalloproteases. Polyhistidine
peptide fragments, known as poly-His tags, play many important functions,
e.g., in metal ion transport in bacterial chaperon proteins. In this
paper, we report a detailed characterization of Cu<sup>2+</sup>, Ni<sup>2+</sup>, and Zn<sup>2+</sup> complexes with the EDDHHHHHHHHHG peptide
fragment (pHG) derived from the venom of the rough scale bush viper
(Atheris squamigera). In order to determine
the thermodynamic properties, stoichiometry, binding sites, and structures
of the metal–pHG complexes, we used a combination of experimental
techniques (potentiometric titrations, electrospray ionization mass
spectrometry, UV–vis spectroscopy, circular dichroism spectroscopy,
and electron paramagnetic resonance spectroscopy) and extensive computational
tools (molecular dynamics simulations and density functional theory
calculations). The results showed that pHG has a high affinity toward
metal ions. The numerous histidine residues located along this sequence
are efficient metal ion chelators with high affinities toward Cu<sup>2+</sup>, Ni<sup>2+</sup>, and Zn<sup>2+</sup> ions. The formation
of an α-helical structure induced by metal ion coordination
and the occurrence of polymorphic binding states were observed. It
is proposed that metal ions can “move along” the poly-His
tag, which serves as a metal ion transport pathway. The coordination
of Cu<sup>2+</sup>, Ni<sup>2+</sup>, and Zn<sup>2+</sup> ions to the
histidine tag is very effective in comparison with other histidine-rich
peptides. The stabilities of the metal–pHG complexes increase
in the order Zn<sup>2+</sup> < Ni<sup>2+</sup>≪ Cu<sup>2+</sup>