The (unusual) aspartic acid in the metal coordination sphere of the prokaryotic zinc finger domain

The possibility of choices of protein ligands and coordination geometries leads to diverse Zn(II) binding sites in zinc-proteins, allowing a range of important biological roles. The prokaryotic Cys2His2 zinc finger domain (originally found in the Ros protein from Agrobacterium tumefaciens) tetrahedrally coordinates zinc through two cysteine and two histidine residues and it does not adopt a correct fold in the absence of the metal ion. Ros is the first structurally characterized member of a family of bacterial proteins that presents several amino acid changes in the positions occupied in Ros by the zinc coordinating residues. In particular, the second position is very often occupied by an aspartic acid although the coordination of structural zinc by an aspartate in eukaryotic zinc fingers is very unusual. Here, by appropriately mutating the protein Ros, we characterize the aspartate role within the coordination sphere of this family of proteins demonstrating how the presence of this residue only slightly perturbs the functional structure of the prokaryotic zinc finger domain while it greatly influences its thermodynamic properties.