Random coil chemical shifts for serine, threonine and tyrosine phosphorylation over a broad pH range

Phosphorylation is one of the main regulators of cellular signaling typically occurring in flexible parts of folded proteins and in intrinsically disordered regions. It can have distinct effects on the chemical environment as well as on the structural properties near the modification site. Secondary chemical shift analysis is the main NMR method for detection of transiently formed secondary structure in intrinsically disordered proteins (IDPs) and the reliability of the analysis depends on an appropriate choice of random coil model. Random coil chemical shifts and sequence correction factors were previously determined for an Ac-QQXQQ-NH₂-peptide series with X being any of the 20 common amino acids. However, a matching dataset on the phosphorylated states has so far only been incompletely determined or determined only at a single pH value. Here we extend the database by the addition of the random coil chemical shifts of the phosphorylated states of serine, threonine and tyrosine measured over a range of pH values covering the pKas of the phosphates and at several temperatures (www.bio.ku.dk/sbinlab/randomcoil). The combined results allow for accurate random coil chemical shift determination of phosphorylated regions at any pH and temperature, minimizing systematic biases of the secondary chemical shifts. Comparison of chemical shifts using random coil sets with and without inclusion of the phosphoryl group, revealed under/over estimations of helicity of up to 33%. The expanded set of random coil values will improve the reliability in detection and quantification of transient secondary structure in phosphorylation-modified IDPs.