David Auble
We often think of drugs as small molecules that interfere with a macromolecular interaction. Here you can see an example of the opposite situation. The human signaling proteins FKBP12 and FRAP do not normally interact with one another, but their interaction can be stabilized by rapamycin, a bacterial compound with immunosuppresive, antifungal, and antiproliferative activity. (You may be familiar with FRAP by its other name, mTOR.) Rapamycin mediates the interaction of the two proteins by binding to hydrophobic pockets on each. The images here are derived from 1fap.
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FKBP12 I rapamycin I FRAP |
Here is a short animation of the interaction that is also worth a look.
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