Inflammation, regardless of whether it is provoked by infection or by tissue damage, starts with the activation of macrophages which initiate a cascade of inflammatory responses by producing the cytokines interleukin-1 (IL-1) and tumour necrosis factor-alpha (ref. 1). Three naturally occurring ligands for the IL-1 receptor (IL1R) exist: the agonists IL-1alpha and IL-1beta and the IL-1-receptor antagonist IL1RA (ref. 2). IL-1 is the only cytokine for which a naturally occurring antagonist is known. Here we describe the crystal structure at 2.7 A resolution of the soluble extracellular part of type-I IL1R complexed with IL1RA. The receptor consists of three immunoglobulin-like domains. Domains 1 and 2 are tightly linked, but domain three is completely separate and connected by a flexible linker. Residues of all three domains contact the antagonist and include the five critical IL1RA residues which were identified by site-directed mutagenesis. A region that is important for biological function in IL-1beta, the 'receptor trigger site' is not in direct contact with the receptor in the IL1RA complex. Modelling studies suggest that this IL-1beta trigger site might induce a movement of domain 3.

Clostridium cellulolyticum is a model mesophilic anaerobic bacterium that efficiently degrades plant cell walls. The recent genome release offers the opportunity to analyse its complete degradation system. A total of 148 putative carbohydrate-active enzymes were identified, and their modular structures and activities were predicted. Among them, 62 dockerin-containing proteins bear catalytic modules from numerous carbohydrate-active enzymes' families and whose diversity reflects the chemical and structural complexity of the plant carbohydrate. The composition of the cellulosomes produced by C. cellulolyticum upon growth on different substrates (cellulose, xylan, and wheat straw) was investigated by LC MS/MS. The majority of the proteins encoded by the cip-cel operon, essential for cellulose degradation, were detected in all cellulosome preparations. In the presence of wheat straw, the natural and most complex of the substrates studied, additional proteins predicted to be involved in hemicellulose degradation were produced. A 32-kb gene cluster encodes the majority of these proteins, all harbouring carbohydrate-binding module 6 or carbohydrate-binding module 22 xylan-binding modules along dockerins. This newly identified xyl-doc gene cluster, specialised in hemicellulose degradation, comes in addition of the cip-cel operon for plant cell wall degradation. Hydrolysis efficiencies determined on the different substrates corroborates the finding that cellulosome composition is adapted to the growth substrate.

A library of 75 different chimeric cellulosomes was constructed as an extension of our previously described approach for the production of model functional complexes (Fierobe, H.-P., Mechaly, A., Tardif, C., Bé laïch, A., Lamed, R., Shoham, Y., Bé laïch, J.-P., and Bayer, E. A. (2001) J. Biol. Chem. 276, 21257-21261), based on the high affinity species-specific cohesin-dockerin interaction. Each complex contained three protein components: (i) a chimeric scaffoldin possessing an optional cellulosebinding module and two cohesins of divergent specificity, and (ii) two cellulases, each bearing a dockerin complementary to one of the divergent cohesins. The activities of the resultant ternary complexes were assayed using different types of cellulose substrates. Organization of cellulolytic enzymes into cellulosome chimeras resulted in characteristically high activities on recalcitrant substrates, whereas the cellulosome chimeras showed little or no advantage over free enzyme systems on tractable substrates. On recalcitrant cellulose, the presence of a cellulose-binding domain on the scaffoldin and enzyme proximity on the resultant complex contributed almost equally to their elevated action on the substrate. For certain enzyme pairs, however, one effect appeared to predominate over the other. The results also indicate that substrate recalcitrance is not necessarily a function of its crystallinity but reflects the overall accessibility of reactive sites.A number of cellulolytic anaerobic microorganisms degrade plant cell wall cellulose by means of macromolecular complexes termed cellulosomes (1-8). In addition to a collection of cellulases, these large complexes can also include enzymes specialized for the degradation of other plant cell wall polymers, such as hemicellulases and pectinases (9, 10). Bacterial cellulosomes are typically composed of a scaffolding protein containing several cohesin domains, which bind to the dockerin domains of the catalytic subunits. The complete dissociation of all known bacterial cellulosomes into individual components requires harsh treatments, such as elevated temperatures and/or the presence of chaotropic agents, thus reflecting the strength of the cohesin-dockerin interaction. In the case of Clostridium cellulolyticum and Clostridium thermocellum, the interaction is Ca 2ϩ -dependent (11, 12) and of high affinity (Ն10 MϪ1 ; see Refs. 11 and 13).The scaffoldins produced by C. cellulolyticum and C. thermocellum contain multiple cohesin domains and a single family 3A cellulose-binding domain (CBD).1 The latter is located at the N terminus of the C. cellulolyticum scaffoldin, whereas the scaffoldin CBD from C. thermocellum adopts an internal position (14, 15). It has been shown for both species that the cohesins can interact with any of the dockerin domains of the same species, suggesting a random incorporation of the catalytic subunits along the scaffoldin (16 -18). The cohesin-dockerin interaction, however, is species-specific, at least between these two clostridia (19).In a previous st...