Conversion of a soluble protein into a potent chaperone in vivo

Abstract

Protein-folding assistance and aggregation inhibition by cellular factors are largely understood in the context of molecular chaperones. As an alternative and complementary model, we previously proposed that, in general, soluble cellular macromolecules including chaperones with large excluded volume and surface charges exhibit the intrinsic chaperone activity to prevent aggregation of their connected polypeptides, irrespective of the connection types, and thus to aid productive protein folding. As a proof of concept, we here demonstrated that a model soluble protein with an inactive protease domain robustly exerted chaperone activity toward various proteins harboring a short protease-recognition tag of 7 residues in Escherichia coli. The chaperone activity of this protein was similar or even superior to that of representative E. coli chaperones in vivo. Furthermore, in vitro refolding experiments confirmed the in vivo results. Our findings revealed that a soluble protein exhibits the intrinsic chaperone activity, which is manifested, upon binding to aggregation-prone proteins. This study gives new insights into the ubiquitous chaperoning role of cellular macromolecules in protein-folding assistance and aggregation inhibition underlying the maintenance of protein solubility and proteostasis in vivo.