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Publication Abstract from PubMed

Plasmodium falciparum, the causative agent of malaria, employs a diverse array of surface displayed proteins to promote dissemination and establish infection in the human host. Of these, Pf3D7_0606800 is highly immunogenic and has been designated a potential top 10 candidate for inclusion in a multicomponent malarial vaccine. The role of Pf3D7_0606800 in parasite biology, however, is unknown and its characterization has been complicated by a lack of sequence identity with proteins of known structure or function. Towards elucidating Pf3D7_0606800 function, we determined its structure to a resolution of 2.35 A using selenium single wavelength anomalous dispersion. A bi-lobed architecture displays the core structural hallmarks of Venus Flytrap (VFT) proteins prompting us to re-annotate Pf3D7_0606800 as PfVFT1. Structural analysis further revealed an extended inter-lobe groove that, when interrogated by molecular docking, appears well suited to bind peptide-based ligands. Collectively, our structural characterization of the highly antigenic P. falciparum surface protein PfVFT1 provides intriguing functional insight and establishes a structural template that could prove valuable for malaria vaccine engineering studies.

The structure of Plasmodium falciparum 3D7_0606800 reveals a bi-lobed architecture that supports re-annotation as a Venus Flytrap protein.,Parker ML, Ramaswamy R, van Gordon K, Powell CJ, Bosch J, Boulanger MJ Protein Sci. 2017 Sep;26(9):1878-1885. doi: 10.1002/pro.3218. Epub 2017 Jul 26. PMID:28681555^[1]

From MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine.