Identification and characterisation of Rab binding motifs in Golgi coiled-coil proteins
Final Report Abstract
This research project was focused understanding how the Rab family of small G proteins binds to Golgi coiled-coil proteins. To gain insights into this function I first investigated the evolution of Rab proteins. This is important because it is well known that specific regions of Golgi coiled-coil proteins bind to a number of different Rab types. The evolutionary study uncovers the relationship between different Rab subtypes and it provides me with a fast collection of sequences from each such subtype. These two pieces of information allow me to identify conserved positions and predict functionally important sites for each Rab subtype. After I understood how Rab proteins evolved, I focussed my attention on the evolution of Golgi coiled-coil proteins. I have identified a set of 122 conserved motifs within eleven distinct Golgi coiledcoil proteins. The conservation pattern of these motifs range from being specific to plants, fungi or metazoans to being broadly conserved among all phyla in the eukaroytic tree of life. Currently, I am constructing a web interface to access and analyze this information. In the last year of this project, I am planning on finishing my evolutionary analysis of Golgi coiled-coil proteins and hope to be able to propose a prediction scheme for Rab binding motifs in those.
Publications
- (2012) Untangling the evolution of Rab G proteins: implications of a comprehensive genomic analysis. BMC Biology Vol. 10
Kloepper TH, Kienle N, Fasshauer D and Munro S
(See online at https://doi.org/10.1186/1741-7007-10-71)
