skip to main content
OSTI.GOV title logo U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Title: Molecular recognition of RAS/RAF complex at the membrane: Role of RAF cysteine-rich domain

Journal Article · · Scientific Reports

Activation of RAF kinase involves the association of its RAS-binding domain (RBD) and cysteine-rich domain (CRD) with membrane-anchored RAS. However, the overall architecture of the RAS/RBD/CRD ternary complex and the orientations of its constituent domains at the membrane remain unclear. Here in this paper, we have combined all-atom and coarse-grained molecular dynamics (MD) simulations with experimental data to construct and validate a model of membrane-anchored CRD, and used this as a basis to explore models of membrane-anchored RAS/RBD/CRD complex. First, simulations of the CRD revealed that it anchors to the membrane via insertion of its two hydrophobic loops, which is consistent with our NMR measurements of CRD bound to nanodiscs. Simulations of the CRD in the context of membrane-anchored RAS/RBD then show how CRD association with either RAS or RBD could play an unexpected role in guiding the membrane orientations of RAS/RBD. This finding has implications for the formation of RAS-RAS dimers, as different membrane orientations of RAS expose distinct putative dimerization interfaces.

Research Organization:
Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Laboratory Directed Research and Development (LDRD) Program; National Institutes of Health (NIH); National Science Foundation (NSF)
Grant/Contract Number:
AC52-06NA25396; AC52-07NA27344; AC02-06CH11357; HHSN261200800001E; P41GM103399
OSTI ID:
1441351
Report Number(s):
LA-UR-18-21268
Journal Information:
Scientific Reports, Vol. 8, Issue 1; ISSN 2045-2322
Publisher:
Nature Publishing GroupCopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 50 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

References (78)

Quantitative Analysis of the Complex between p21 and the Ras-binding Domain of the Human Raf-1 Protein Kinase journal February 1995
Allosteric Activation of Functionally Asymmetric RAF Kinase Dimers journal August 2013
Structural basis of recognition of farnesylated and methylated KRAS4b by PDEδ journal October 2016
Going Backward: A Flexible Geometric Approach to Reverse Transformation from Coarse Grained to Atomistic Models journal January 2014
Activity of Plasma Membrane-recruited Raf-1 Is Regulated by Ras via the Raf Zinc Finger journal August 1997
The Ras superfamily at a glance journal March 2005
Regulation of RAF protein kinases in ERK signalling journal April 2015
Crystal structure of a BRAF kinase domain monomer explains basis for allosteric regulation journal December 2014
Crystal structure of the Cys2 activator-binding domain of protein kinase Cδ in complex with phorbol ester journal June 1995
Comparison of simple potential functions for simulating liquid water journal July 1983
Martini straight: Boosting performance using a shorter cutoff and GPUs journal February 2016
GROMACS: High performance molecular simulations through multi-level parallelism from laptops to supercomputers journal September 2015
NMR Characterization of Full-length Farnesylated and Non-farnesylated H-Ras and its Implications for Raf Activation journal November 2004
In situ selectivity profiling and crystal structure of SML-8-73-1, an active site inhibitor of oncogenic K-Ras G12C journal June 2014
An analysis of the accuracy of Langevin and molecular dynamics algorithms journal December 1988
The higher level of complexity of K-Ras4B activation at the membrane journal April 2016
Farnesylated and methylated KRAS4b: high yield production of protein suitable for biophysical studies of prenylated protein-lipid interactions journal November 2015
UCSF Chimera?A visualization system for exploratory research and analysis journal January 2004
The solution structure of the Raf-1 cysteine-rich domain: a novel ras and phospholipid binding site. journal August 1996
Wild-Type and Mutant B-RAF Activate C-RAF through Distinct Mechanisms Involving Heterodimerization journal December 2005
RAS isoforms and mutations in cancer at a glance journal March 2016
Interactions of Protein Kinase C-α C1A and C1B Domains with Membranes: A Combined Computational and Experimental Study journal August 2014
Kinase-Dead BRAF and Oncogenic RAS Cooperate to Drive Tumor Progression through CRAF journal January 2010
Computational Modeling Reveals that Signaling Lipids Modulate the Orientation of K-Ras4A at the Membrane Reflecting Protein Topology journal April 2017
Raf kinases in cancer–roles and therapeutic opportunities journal May 2011
Two Distinct Raf Domains Mediate Interaction with Ras journal April 1995
Alternative schemes for the inclusion of a reaction-field correction into molecular dynamics simulations: Influence on the simulated energetic, structural, and dielectric properties of liquid water journal April 1998
CHARMM-GUI: A web-based graphical user interface for CHARMM journal March 2008
Canonical sampling through velocity rescaling journal January 2007
NMRFAM-SPARKY: enhanced software for biomolecular NMR spectroscopy journal December 2014
Particle mesh Ewald: An N ⋅log( N ) method for Ewald sums in large systems journal June 1993
Differential Interaction of the Ras Family GTP-binding Proteins H-Ras, Rap1A, and R-Ras with the Putative Effector Molecules Raf Kinase and Ral-Guanine Nucleotide Exchange Factor journal March 1996
The Strength of Interaction at the Raf Cysteine-Rich Domain Is a Critical Determinant of Response of Raf to Ras Family Small GTPases journal September 1999
NMR Structure of a Protein Kinase C-γ Phorbol-Binding Domain and Study of Protein−Lipid Micelle Interactions journal September 1997
Molecular dynamics with coupling to an external bath journal October 1984
Update of the CHARMM All-Atom Additive Force Field for Lipids: Validation on Six Lipid Types journal June 2010
Optimization of the Additive CHARMM All-Atom Protein Force Field Targeting Improved Sampling of the Backbone ϕ, ψ and Side-Chain χ 1 and χ 2 Dihedral Angles journal August 2012
Oncogenic K-Ras Binds to an Anionic Membrane in Two Distinct Orientations: A Molecular Dynamics Analysis journal March 2016
Macroscopic conductivity of aqueous electrolyte solutions scales with ultrafast microscopic ion motions text January 2020
Computational Lipidomics with insane : A Versatile Tool for Generating Custom Membranes for Molecular Simulations journal April 2015
Combining an Elastic Network With a Coarse-Grained Molecular Force Field: Structure, Dynamics, and Intermolecular Recognition journal August 2009
Oncogenic and RASopathy-associated K-RAS mutations relieve membrane-dependent occlusion of the effector-binding site journal May 2015
CHARMM-GUI Membrane Builder toward realistic biological membrane simulations journal August 2014
K-Ras4B Remains Monomeric on Membranes over a Wide Range of Surface Densities and Lipid Compositions journal January 2018
Molecular basis for assembly of the shieldin complex and its implications for NHEJ journal April 2020
Improving efficiency of large time-scale molecular dynamics simulations of hydrogen-rich systems journal June 1999
Computational and biochemical characterization of two partially overlapping interfaces and multiple weak-affinity K-Ras dimers journal January 2017
ClusPro: an automated docking and discrimination method for the prediction of protein complexes journal December 2003
Molecular dynamics simulations of water and biomolecules with a Monte Carlo constant pressure algorithm journal January 2004
Dragging Ras Back in the Ring journal March 2014
The ClusPro web server for protein–protein docking journal January 2017
Meaningful relationships: the regulation of the Ras/Raf/MEK/ERK pathway by protein interactions journal October 2000
A Small Molecule RAS-Mimetic Disrupts RAS Association with Effector Proteins to Block Signaling journal April 2016
Amber 2017, University of California, San Francisco dataset January 2017
Optimized Phospholipid Bilayer Nanodiscs Facilitate High-Resolution Structure Determination of Membrane Proteins journal January 2013
The RAF proteins take centre stage journal November 2004
GTP-Dependent K-Ras Dimerization journal July 2015
B- and C-RAF Display Essential Differences in Their Binding to Ras journal July 2007
Mechanism of Activation of the RAF-ERK Signaling Pathway by Oncogenic Mutations of B-RAF journal March 2004
The role of G-domain orientation and nucleotide state on the Ras isoform-specific membrane interaction journal August 2012
An ensemble dynamics approach to decipher solid-state NMR observables of membrane proteins journal February 2012
Numerical integration of the cartesian equations of motion of a system with constraints: molecular dynamics of n-alkanes journal March 1977
Allosteric Effects of the Oncogenic RasQ61L Mutant on Raf-RBD journal March 2015
The MARTINI Force Field:  Coarse Grained Model for Biomolecular Simulations journal July 2007
An intact Raf zinc finger is required for optimal binding to processed Ras and for ras-dependent Raf activation in situ. journal January 1997
Structure, dynamics and electrostatics of the active site of glutaredoxin 3 from Escherichia coli: comparison with functionally related proteins journal July 2001
NMRPipe: A multidimensional spectral processing system based on UNIX pipes journal November 1995
The complexity of Raf-1 regulation journal April 1997
Cysteine-rich Region of Raf-1 Interacts with Activator Domain of Post-translationally Modified Ha-Ras journal December 1995
An overview of the Amber biomolecular simulation package: Amber biomolecular simulation package
  • Salomon-Ferrer, Romelia; Case, David A.; Walker, Ross C.
  • Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Computational Molecular Science, Vol. 3, Issue 2 https://doi.org/10.1002/wcms.1121
journal September 2012
BRAFV600E: Implications for Carcinogenesis and Molecular Therapy journal March 2011
Protein production by auto-induction in high-density shaking cultures journal May 2005
Targeting the Raf-MEK-ERK mitogen-activated protein kinase cascade for the treatment of cancer journal May 2007
Elucidation of Binding Determinants and Functional Consequences of Ras/Raf-Cysteine-rich Domain Interactions journal April 2000
Conditionally oncogenic forms of the A-Raf and B-Raf protein kinases display different biological and biochemical properties in NIH 3T3 cells. journal November 1995
Interplay of C1 and C2 Domains of Protein Kinase C-α in Its Membrane Binding and Activation journal July 1999
Human RAS Superfamily Proteins and Related GTPases journal September 2004
The cysteine-rich region of raf-1 kinase contains zinc, translocates to liposomes, and is adjacent to a segment that binds GTP-ras journal April 1994

Cited By (8)

SHOC2 complex-driven RAF dimerization selectively contributes to ERK pathway dynamics journal June 2019
Architecture of autoinhibited and active BRAF–MEK1–14-3-3 complexes journal October 2019
Computational Modeling of Realistic Cell Membranes journal January 2019
Autoinhibition in Ras effectors Raf, PI3Kα, and RASSF5: a comprehensive review underscoring the challenges in pharmacological intervention journal September 2018
Subcellular localization of Rap1 GTPase activator CalDAG‐GEFI is orchestrated by interaction of its atypical C1 domain with membrane phosphoinositides journal December 2019
KRAS Prenylation Is Required for Bivalent Binding with Calmodulin in a Nucleotide-Independent Manner journal March 2019
Targeting Aberrant RAS/RAF/MEK/ERK Signaling for Cancer Therapy journal January 2020
Presence or Absence of Ras Dimerization Shows Distinct Kinetic Signature in Ras-Raf Interaction journal April 2020