Trinitrophenyl derivatives of adenine nucleotides are widely used for probing ATP-binding sites. Here we describe crystal structures of Ca 2þ -ATPase, a representative P-type ATPase, in the absence of Ca 2þ with bound ATP, trinitrophenyl-ATP, -ADP, and -AMP at better than 2.4-Å resolution, stabilized with thapsigargin, a potent inhibitor. These crystal structures show that the binding mode of the trinitrophenyl derivatives is distinctly different from the parent adenine nucleotides. The adenine binding pocket in the nucleotide binding domain of Ca 2þ -ATPase is now occupied by the trinitrophenyl group, and the side chains of two arginines sandwich the adenine ring, accounting for the much higher affinities of the trinitrophenyl derivatives. Trinitrophenyl nucleotides exhibit a pronounced fluorescence in the E2P ground state but not in the other E2 states. Crystal structures of the E2P and E2 ∼ P analogues of Ca 2þ -ATPase with bound trinitrophenyl-AMP show that different arrangements of the three cytoplasmic domains alter the orientation and water accessibility of the trinitrophenyl group, explaining the origin of "superfluorescence." Thus, the crystal structures demonstrate that ATP and its derivatives are highly adaptable to a wide range of site topologies stabilized by a variety of interactions.crystallography | ion pump | nucleotide derivatives T rinitrophenyl (TNP)-nucleotides (1) are often used for probing the structure of ATP-binding sites and conformational changes arising from nucleotide binding (2, 3), and for measuring the affinity of ATP by competition experiments (2, 4). It is a preferred ATP analogue for photochemical crosslinking with azide derivatives (5). These applications utilize the enhancement of fluorescence or absorption of visible light of the TNP group upon binding to a protein (6). Because of its sensitivity, competition with ATP/ADP has been a valuable means for examining mutational effects on nucleotide affinity (7). Thus, TNP nucleotides have been widely used with F1 (8), myosin (1), and P-type ATPases (2-5, 7, 9, 10), among others.Nonetheless, whether TNP derivatives are good mimics of authentic adenine nucleotides (AxPs) may be questionable. In several proteins TNP nucleotides have much higher affinities than the genuine AxPs. For instance, TNP-ATP is a high affinity (nM) antagonist of P2X receptors, which have IC 50 for ATP (or AMPPCP) in the μM range (11). The affinity is at least one order of magnitude higher in the E2 states of Ca 2þ -ATPase (3, 12) and Na þ , K þ -ATPase (4), representative P-type ATPases. Furthermore, TNP-AMP binds to Ca 2þ -ATPase similarly to or even more strongly than TNP-ATP (12), in marked contrast to AxPs. Thus, a substantially different binding mode of TNP derivatives is suggested. Although more than 20 entries are registered in the Protein Data Bank (PDB) for Ca 2þ -ATPase (reviewed in ref. 13), no structure with a bound TNP nucleotide exists. In fact, only three crystal structures have been published with bound TNP nucleotides. They are a bacterial h...