Cryo-electron Tomography of Pdu Microcompartments: A Polyhedral Bacterial Organelle
EMSL Project ID
60125
Abstract
Bacterial microcompartments, or MCPs, are organelle-like supramolecular structures, found in nearly 20% of all bacteria. They metabolize a variety of substrates in an enclosed space using enzymes encased within a proteinacious shell comprised primarily of homologous tesselating hexameric proteins. Previous cryo-electron tromography (cryoET) work on the carboxysome, the most regular of the MCPs, revealed a nearly icosahedral shell at modest resolution. The 1,2-propanediol (Pdu) MCP is a polyhedral-shaped MCP that exists in a variety of sizes and morphologies. To date, the Pdu MCP has not been confirmed to obey icosahedral geometry (ie. a polyhedron with 20 faces and 12 vertices). We will use cryoET to create 3D reconstructions in order to create a library of Pdu MCPs to define their geometries. Moreover, we will use hybrid methods -- subtomogram averaging and existing crystal structures of individual shell proteins -- to obtain a full atomic model of the Pdu MCP.
Project Details
Start Date
2021-05-03
End Date
2023-10-01
Status
Closed
Released Data Link
Team
Principal Investigator