Title: The diversity and molecular modelling analysis of B₁₂-dependent and B₁₂-independent glycerol dehydratases

Authors: Yuemin Liu, August A. Gallo, Rakesh K. Bajpai, Andrei Chistoserdov, Andrew T. Nelson, Leah N. Segura, Wu Xu

Addresses: Department of Chemistry, University of Louisiana at Lafayette, Lafayette 70504, USA. ' Department of Chemistry, University of Louisiana at Lafayette, Lafayette 70504, USA. ' Department of Chemical Engineering, University of Louisiana at Lafayette, Lafayette 70504, USA. ' Department of Biology, University of Louisiana at Lafayette, Lafayette 70504, USA. ' Department of Chemistry, University of Louisiana at Lafayette, Lafayette 70504, USA. ' Department of Chemistry, University of Louisiana at Lafayette, Lafayette 70504, USA. ' Department of Chemistry, University of Louisiana at Lafayette, Lafayette 70504, USA

Abstract: To broaden our knowledge on the diversity of glycerol dehydratases, comprehensive sequence and molecular modelling analyses of these enzymes were performed. Our sequence analysis showed that B₁₂-dependent and B₁₂-independent glycerol dehydratases are not related, suggesting that they evolved from different ancestors. Second, our study demonstrated that a gene fusion event occurred between α and β subunits of B₁₂-dependent glycerol dehydratases in several bacteria during enzyme evolution. In addition, our sequence and molecular modelling analyses revealed more B₁₂-independent glycerol dehydratases including hypothetical proteins. Furthermore, we found that some microorganisms contain both B₁₂-dependent and B₁₂-independent glycerol dehydratases in their genomes.

Keywords: bioinformatics; 1,3-propanediol; glycerol dehydratase; structure; function; gene fusion; coenzyme B12; molecular modelling; enzyme sequences; sequence analysis.

DOI: 10.1504/IJBRA.2010.037988

International Journal of Bioinformatics Research and Applications, 2010 Vol.6 No.5, pp.484 - 507

Published online: 07 Jan 2011 *

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