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Updated: May 14, 2026

Investigating Tissue- and Organ-specific Phytochrome Responses using FACS-assisted Cell-type Specific Expression Profiling in Arabidopsis thaliana
Published on: May 29, 2010
Cloning, expression, purification, crystallization and preliminary X-ray diffraction analysis of AHP2, a signal
Oksana Degtjarik1, Radka Dopitova, Sandra Puehringer
1South Bohemian Research Center of Aquaculture and Biodiversity of Hydrocenoses and School of Complex Systems, University of South Bohemia, Zamek 136, 37333 Nove Hrady, Czech Republic.
Abstract:
Histidine-containing phosphotransfer proteins from Arabidopsis thaliana (AHP1-5) act as intermediates between sensor histidine kinases and response regulators in a signalling system called multi-step phosphorelay (MSP). AHP proteins mediate and potentially integrate various MSP-based signalling pathways (e.g. cytokinin or osmosensing). However, structural information about AHP proteins and their importance in MSP signalling is still lacking. To obtain a deeper insight into the structural basis of AHP-mediated signal transduction, the three-dimensional structure of AHP2 was determined. The AHP2 coding sequence was cloned into pRSET B expression vector, enabling production of AHP2 fused to an N-terminal His tag. AHP2 was expressed in soluble form in Escherichia coli strain BL21 (DE3) pLysS and then purified to homogeneity using metal chelate affinity chromatography and anion-exchange chromatography under reducing conditions. Successful crystallization in a buffer which was optimized for thermal stability yielded crystals that diffracted to 2.5 Å resolution.

