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Structure of Pro-Activin A Precursor at 2.3 A Resolution
Structural highlights
FunctionINHBA_HUMAN Inhibins and activins inhibit and activate, respectively, the secretion of follitropin by the pituitary gland. Inhibins/activins are involved in regulating a number of diverse functions such as hypothalamic and pituitary hormone secretion, gonadal hormone secretion, germ cell development and maturation, erythroid differentiation, insulin secretion, nerve cell survival, embryonic axial development or bone growth, depending on their subunit composition. Inhibins appear to oppose the functions of activins. Publication Abstract from PubMedActivins are growth factors with multiple roles in the development and homeostasis. Like all TGF-beta family of growth factors, activins are synthesized as large precursors from which mature dimeric growth factors are released proteolytically. Here we have studied the activation of activin A and determined crystal structures of the unprocessed precursor and of the cleaved pro-mature complex. Replacing the natural furin cleavage site with a HRV 3C protease site, we show how the protein gains its bioactivity after proteolysis and is as active as the isolated mature domain. The complex remains associated in conditions used for biochemical analysis with a dissociation constant of 5 nM, but the pro-domain can be actively displaced from the complex by follistatin. Our high-resolution structures of pro-activin A share features seen in the pro-TGF-beta1 and pro-BMP-9 structures, but reveal a new oligomeric arrangement, with a domain-swapped, cross-armed conformation for the protomers in the dimeric protein. Structure and activation of pro-activin A.,Wang X, Fischer G, Hyvonen M Nat Commun. 2016 Jul 4;7:12052. doi: 10.1038/ncomms12052. PMID:27373274[1] From MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine. See AlsoReferences
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