Strand-Swapped SH3 Domain Dimer with Superoxide Dismutase Activity

The design of metalloproteins allows us to better understand metal complexation in proteins and the resulting function. In this study, we incorporated a Cu²⁺-binding site into a natural protein domain, the 58 amino acid c-Crk-SH3, to create a miniaturized superoxide dismutase model, termed SO1. The resulting low complexity metalloprotein was characterized for structure and function by circular dichroism and UV spectroscopy as well as EPR spectroscopy and X-ray crystallography. The miniprotein was found to be a strand-swapped dimer with an unusual coupled binuclear Type 2-like copper center in each protomer. SO1-Cu was found to be SOD-active with an activity only 1 order of magnitude lower than that of natural SOD enzymes and 1 to 2 orders of magnitude higher than that of other low-complexity SOD protein models of similar size. This serendipitous design provides us with a new structural template for future designs of binuclear metalloproteins with different metal ions and functions.