Bioinformatic prediction of gp41 protein in HIV-1 CRF01_AE strain

Abstract:

Objective：To predict the extracellular domain and transmembrane domain of HIV-1 gp41 protein，and to investigate its structure and function. Methods：The gp41 gene and its protein-encoding sequence were obtained from the NCBI GenBank database. ExPASy ProtParam tool，ProtScale，SignalP 4.0 Server，TMHMM Server v.2.0，SWISS-MODEL and Predict Protein software were used to predict the biological properties of gp41 protein. Results：The HIV-1 gp41 gene had an ORF length of 666 bp and encoded 222 amino acids. Its molecular formula was C1164H1815N317O325S6，and the isoelectric point was 8.60. It was a stable and hydrophobic protein. This protein had a transmembrane region and the signal peptide cleavage site was located between the amino acids 20 and 21. Its sec－ondary structure mostly consisted of random coil，β-fold，and α-helix，and thus it was an all-helix protein. It also had an N-terminal signal peptide and guided the extracellular secretion of protein. In addition，gp41 protein had 4 protein-protein binding sites and 1 protein-DNA binding site，which could regulate various biological functions of gp41 protein. Conclusion：This study predicts the structure and function of gp41 protein and lays a foundation for research on the molecular mechanism of gp41 protein in disease de－velopment and progression.