Frameshifting preserves key physicochemical properties of proteins

Lukas Bartonek, Daniel Braun, Bojan Zagrovic

Publications: Contribution to journalArticlePeer Reviewed

Abstract

Frameshifts in protein coding sequences are widely perceived as resulting in either nonfunctional or even deleterious protein products. Indeed, frameshifts typically lead to markedly altered protein sequences and premature stop codons. By analyzing complete proteomes from all three domains of life, we demonstrate that, in contrast, several key physicochemical properties of protein sequences exhibit significant robustness against +1 and −1 frameshifts. In particular, we show that hydrophobicity profiles of many protein sequences remain largely invariant upon frameshifting. For example, over 2,900 human proteins exhibit a Pearson’s correlation coefficient R between the hydrophobicity profiles of the original and the +1-frameshifted variants greater than 0.7, despite an average sequence identity between the two of only 6.5% in this group. We observe a similar effect for protein sequence profiles of affinity for certain nucleobases as well as protein sequence profiles of intrinsic disorder. Finally, analysis of significance and optimality demonstrates that frameshift stability is embedded in the structure of the universal genetic code and may have contributed to shaping it. Our results suggest that frameshifting may be a powerful evolutionary mechanism for creating new proteins with vastly different sequences, yet similar physicochemical properties to the proteins from which they originate.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)5907-5912
Number of pages6
JournalProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (PNAS)
Volume117
Issue number11
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 17 Mar 2020

Austrian Fields of Science 2012

  • 106013 Genetics
  • 106012 Evolutionary research

Keywords

  • Amino Acid Sequence
  • Chemical Phenomena
  • Evolution, Molecular
  • Frameshift Mutation
  • Genetic Code
  • Humans
  • Hydrophobic and Hydrophilic Interactions
  • Open Reading Frames
  • Proteins/chemistry
  • frameshift
  • evolution
  • COMPLEMENTARITY
  • genetic code
  • MESSENGER-RNAS
  • AMINO-ACID
  • GENETIC-CODE
  • hydrophobicity
  • EVOLUTION
  • DATABASE
  • MUTATION

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