The 90-kDa heat shock protein (Hsp90) is a molecular chaperone that assists both in ATP-independent sequestration of damaged proteins, and in ATP-dependent folding of numerous targets, such as nuclear hormone receptors and protein kinases. Recent work from our lab and others has established the existence of a second, C-terminal nucleotide binding site besides the well characterized N-terminal, geldanamycin-sensitive ATP-binding site. The cryptic C-terminal site becomes open only after the occupancy of the N-terminal site. Our present work demonstrates the applicability of the oxidative nucleotide affinity cleavage in the site-specific characterization of nucleotide binding proteins. We performed a systematic analysis of the nucleotide binding specificity of the Hsp90 nucleotide binding sites. N-terminal binding is specific to adenosine nucleotides with an intact adenine ring. Nicotinamide adenine dinucleotides and diadenosine polyphosphate alarmones are specific N-terminal nucleotides. The C-terminal binding site is much more unspecific-it interacts with both purine and pirimidine nucleotides. Efficient binding to the C-terminal site requires both charged residues and a larger hydrophobic moiety. GTP and UTP are specific C-terminal nucleotides. 2¢,3¢-O-(2,4,6-trinitrophenyl)-nucleotides (TNP-ATP, TNP-GTP) and pyrophosphate access the C-terminal binding site without the need for an occupied N-terminal site. Our data provide additional evidence for the dynamic domaindomain interactions of Hsp90, give hints for the design of novel types of specific Hsp90 inhibitors, and raise the possibility that besides ATP, other small molecules might also interact with the C-terminal nucleotide binding site in vivo.Keywords: alarmones; Hsp90; molecular chaperone; NAD; nucleotide analogs.The 90-kDa heat shock protein (Hsp90) is a cytoplasmic chaperone that helps the folding of nuclear hormone receptors and various protein kinases [1][2][3][4]. Hsp90 is an ATP-binding chaperone [5,6] and ATP binding induces a conformational change in Hsp90 [7,8]. Assembly of the Hsp90-organized chaperone machinery, the foldosome, with target proteins requires ATP [9,10]; moreover, ATP binding and hydrolysis are essential for the in vivo function of Hsp90 [11,12].Crystallization of the N-terminal domain uncovered a Bergerat-type ATP-binding fold [13], which can also be occupied by geldanamycin (GA) [14] and radicicol [15,16]. These natural antitumor antibiotics abolish Hsp90-dependent folding of immature client proteins, and direct them to proteolysis [17,18].Recent communications have reported a second ATPbinding site in the C-terminal domain of Hsp90 [19][20][21]. Our studies demonstrated that the C-terminal nucleotide binding site becomes accessible only after the occupancy of the N-terminal site and is sensitive to cisplatin [20].The characterization of the nucleotide binding properties of Hsp90 has been hindered for quite a while by the low affinity interactions of nucleotides with this protein, which required the development of new experiment...