Structural characterization of human tryptophan hydroxylase 2 reveals that L-Phe is superior to L-Trp as the regulatory domain ligand

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Tryptophan hydroxylase 2 (TPH2) catalyzes the rate-limiting step in serotonin biosynthesis in the brain. Consequently, regulation of TPH2 is relevant for serotonin-related diseases, yet the regulatory mechanism of TPH2 is poorly understood and structural and dynamical insights are missing. We use NMR spectroscopy to determine the structure of a 47 N-terminally truncated variant of the regulatory domain (RD) dimer of human TPH2 in complex with L-Phe, and show that L-Phe is the superior RD ligand compared with the natural substrate, L-Trp. Using cryo-EM, we obtain a low-resolution structure of a similarly truncated variant of the complete tetrameric enzyme with dimerized RDs. The cryo-EM two-dimensional (2D) class averages additionally indicate that the RDs are dynamic in the tetramer and likely exist in a monomer-dimer equilibrium. Our results provide structural information on the RD as an isolated domain and in the TPH2 tetramer, which will facilitate future elucidation of TPH2's regulatory mechanism.

Original languageEnglish
JournalStructure (London, England : 1993)
Volume31
Issue number6
Pages (from-to)689-699e6
Number of pages11
ISSN0969-2126
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2023

Bibliographical note

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Copyright © 2023 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

    Research areas

  • cryo-EM, protein regulation, protein structure and dynamics, serotonin biosynthesis, solution NMR, Tryptophan hydroxylase

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