PMID: 19818708 , Related PDB ids: 3HQH, 3HQI, 3HQL, 3HQM, 3HSV, 3HTM, 3HU6, 3HVE, 3IVB, 3IVQ, 3IVV

Authors:

Zhuang M, Calabrese MF, Liu J, Waddell MB, Nourse A, Hammel M, Miller DJ, Walden H, Duda DM, Seyedin SN, Hoggard T, Harper JW, White KP, Schulman BA

Title:

Structures of SPOP-substrate complexes: insights into molecular architectures of BTB-Cul3 ubiquitin ligases.

Journal:

Mol Cell. 2009 Oct 9;36(1):39-50.

Abstract:

In the largest E3 ligase subfamily, Cul3 binds a BTB domain, and an associated protein-interaction domain such as MATH recruits substrates for ubiquitination. Here, we present biochemical and structural analyses of the MATH-BTB protein, SPOP. We define a SPOP-binding consensus (SBC) and determine structures revealing recognition of SBCs from the phosphatase Puc, the transcriptional regulator Ci, and the chromatin component MacroH2A. We identify a dimeric SPOP-Cul3 assembly involving a conserved helical structure C-terminal of BTB domains, which we call "3-box" due to its facilitating Cul3 binding and its resemblance to F-/SOCS-boxes in other cullin-based E3s. Structural flexibility between the substrate-binding MATH and Cul3-binding BTB/3-box domains potentially allows a SPOP dimer to engage multiple SBCs found within a single substrate, such as Puc. These studies provide a molecular understanding of how MATH-BTB proteins recruit substrates to Cul3 and how their dimerization and conformational variability may facilitate avid interactions with diverse substrates.