Chirality and Protein Biosynthesis

Abstract

Chirality is present at all levels of structural hierarchy of protein and plays a significant role in protein biosynthesis. The macromolecules involved in protein biosynthesis such as aminoacyl tRNA synthetase and ribosome have chiral subunits. Despite the omnipresence of chirality in the biosynthetic pathway, its origin, role in current pathway, and importance is far from understood. In this review we first present an introduction to biochirality and its relevance to protein biosynthesis. Major propositions about the prebiotic origin of biomolecules are presented with particular reference to proteins and nucleic acids. The problem of the origin of homochirality is unresolved at present. The chiral discrimination by enzymes involved in protein synthesis is essential for keeping the life process going. However, questions remained pertaining to the mechanism of chiral discrimination and concomitant retention of biochirality. We discuss the experimental evidence which shows that it is virtually impossible to incorporate D-amino acids in protein structures in present biosynthetic pathways via any of the two major steps of protein synthesis, namely aminoacylation and peptide bond formation reactions. Molecular level explanations of the stringent chiral specificity in each step are extended based on computational analysis. A detailed account of the current state of understanding of the mechanism of chiral discrimination during aminoacylation in the active site of aminoacyl tRNA synthetase and peptide bond formation in ribosomal peptidyl transferase center is presented. Finally, it is pointed out that the understanding of the mechanism of retention of enantiopurity has implications in developing novel enzyme mimetic systems and biocatalysts and might be useful in chiral drug design.