SUMMARY Stress granules are membrane-less organelles composed of RNA-binding proteins (RBPs) and RNA. Functional impairment of stress granules has been implicated in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, frontotemporal dementia and multisystem proteinopathy - diseases that are characterized by fibrillar inclusions of RBPs. Genetic evidence suggests a link between persistent stress granules and the accumulation of pathological inclusions. Here we demonstrate that the RBP hnRNPA1 undergoes liquid-liquid phase separation (LLPS) into protein-rich droplets mediated by a low complexity sequence domain (LCD). While the LCD of hnRNPA1 is sufficient to mediate LLPS, the RNA recognition motifs contribute to LLPS in the presence of RNA, giving rise to several mechanisms for regulating assembly. Importantly, while not required for LLPS, fibrillization is enhanced in protein-rich droplets. We suggest that LCD-mediated LLPS contributes to the assembly of stress granules and their liquid properties, and provides a mechanistic link between persistent stress granules and fibrillar protein pathology in disease.

Vaccines and therapeutics are urgently needed for the pandemic caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). Here, we screen human monoclonal antibodies (mAb) targeting the receptor binding domain (RBD) of the viral spike protein via antibody library constructed from peripheral blood mononuclear cells of a convalescent patient. The CT-P59 mAb potently neutralizes SARS-CoV-2 isolates including the D614G variant without antibody-dependent enhancement effect. Complex crystal structure of CT-P59 Fab/RBD shows that CT-P59 blocks interaction regions of RBD for angiotensin converting enzyme 2 (ACE2) receptor with an orientation that is notably different from previously reported RBD-targeting mAbs. Furthermore, therapeutic effects of CT-P59 are evaluated in three animal models (ferret, hamster, and rhesus monkey), demonstrating a substantial reduction in viral titer along with alleviation of clinical symptoms. Therefore, CT-P59 may be a promising therapeutic candidate for COVID-19.

Membrane‐less organelles in cells are large, dynamic protein/protein or protein/RNA assemblies that have been reported in some cases to have liquid droplet properties. However, the molecular interactions underlying the recruitment of components are not well understood. Herein, we study how the ability to form higher‐order assemblies influences the recruitment of the speckle‐type POZ protein (SPOP) to nuclear speckles. SPOP, a cullin‐3‐RING ubiquitin ligase (CRL3) substrate adaptor, self‐associates into higher‐order oligomers; that is, the number of monomers in an oligomer is broadly distributed and can be large. While wild‐type SPOP localizes to liquid nuclear speckles, self‐association‐deficient SPOP mutants have a diffuse distribution in the nucleus. SPOP oligomerizes through its BTB and BACK domains. We show that BTB‐mediated SPOP dimers form linear oligomers via BACK domain dimerization, and we determine the concentration‐dependent populations of the resulting oligomeric species. Higher‐order oligomerization of SPOP stimulates CRL3SPOP ubiquitination efficiency for its physiological substrate Gli3, suggesting that nuclear speckles are hotspots of ubiquitination. Dynamic, higher‐order protein self‐association may be a general mechanism to concentrate functional components in membrane‐less cellular bodies.

The majority of protein architectures exhibit elements of structural symmetry, and "gene duplication and fusion" is the evolutionary mechanism generally hypothesized to be responsible for their emergence from simple peptide motifs. Despite the central importance of the gene duplication and fusion hypothesis, experimental support for a plausible evolutionary pathway for a specific protein architecture has yet to be effectively demonstrated. To address this question, a unique "top-down symmetric deconstruction" strategy was utilized to successfully identify a simple peptide motif capable of recapitulating, via gene duplication and fusion processes, a symmetric protein architecture (the threefold symmetric β-trefoil fold). The folding properties of intermediary forms in this deconstruction agree precisely with a previously proposed "conserved architecture" model for symmetric protein evolution. Furthermore, a route through foldable sequence-space between the simple peptide motif and extant protein fold is demonstrated. These results provide compelling experimental support for a plausible evolutionary pathway of symmetric protein architecture via gene duplication and fusion processes.protein design | protein folding | protein symmetry

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