Common active site architecture and binding strategy of four phenylpropanoid P450s from Arabidopsis thaliana as revealed by molecular modeling

Despite extensive primary sequence diversity, crystal structures of several bacterial cytochrome P450 monooxygenases (P450s) and a single eukaryotic P450 indicate that these enzymes share a structural core of α-helices and β-sheets and vary in the loop regions contacting individual substrates. To determine the extent to which individual structural features are conserved among divergent P450s existing in a single biosynthetic pathway, we have modeled the structures of four highly divergent P450s (CYP73A5, CYP84A1, CYP75B1, CYP98A3) in the Arabidopsis phenylpropanoid pathway synthesizing lignins, flavonoids and anthocyanins. Analysis of these models has indicated that, despite primary sequence identities as low as 13%, the structural cores and several loop regions of these P450s are highly conserved. Substrate docking indicated that all four enzymes employ a common strategy to identify their substrates in that their cinnamate-derived substrates align along helix I with their aromatic ring positioned towards the C-terminus of this helix and their aliphatic tails positioned towards the N-terminus. Further similarity was observed in the way the substrates contact the consensus P450 substrate recognition sites (SRS). Residues predicted to contact the aromatic ring region exist in SRS5, SRS6 and the C-terminal portion of SRS4 and residues contacting the distal end of each substrate exist in SRS1, SRS2 and the N-terminal portion of SRS4. Alignments of the regions contacting the aromatic ring region indicate that SRS4, SRS5 and SRS6 share higher degrees of sequence conservation than found in SRS1, SRS2 or the full-length protein.