ABSTRACT
NMR spectroscopy of the E-domain fragment of
Escherichia coli
5S rRNA indicates that this molecule exists in solution as either a stem-loop or as a duplex with two U-U base pairs in the bulge region. At temperatures below 27
o
C, interconversion between the monomeric and dimeric forms in solution occurs on
a time scale of weeks and allows the preparation of samples on which NMR
structure determinations can be carried out on predominantly monomeric or
dimeric species. The NMR results obtained provide comparison data for the distinction between A- and B-form
E.coli
5S rRNA and for the possible kinetics of conversion between these forms. NMR
evidence is presented that the duplex form also exists in crystals and
suggestions are made for means to obtain stem-loop conformations of E-domain and other small RNA stem-loop sequences in crystals.
The determination of structures for larger RNA molecules such as 5S rRNA has so
far been limited by difficulties in obtaining crystals of adequate size and
diffractive resolution (
1
,
2
) or by the lack of appropriate NMR methods for dealing with RNA molecules of
this size. This has led to attempts to obtain high resolution structures for
smaller fragments of the large RNA molecule and in our case has led to X-ray studies of the A- and E-domains of 5S rRNA (
3
,
4
). An important precondition is that the fragments assume the same conformation
in the crystal as in the complete RNA molecule, e.g. a duplex for the A-domain (
3
). In the case of the E-domain of
Escherichia coli
5S rRNA, alternative structures involving either a stem-loop or the formation of a duplex with the C-domain have been proposed (
5
) and it is therefore of interest to identify whether the E-domain has multiple structural possibilities and to define conditions
under which specific structures can be obtained for detailed structural
determinations. We are also interested in obtaining structural data for the E-domain by both NMR and crystallography in order to compare the structures
and hydration seen by the two methods. As with structural studies of proteins,
use of structural data obtained by both methods can also be important to provide calibration (Karplus curves) for interpretation of spin-spin coupling information derived from NMR spectra.
Stem-loops represent a fragment type of particular interest because they
frequently exist in more complex RNA secondary structures. However, small RNA hairpins may exist in equilibrium between a monomeric stem-loop and its anti-symmetric dimer and/or even higher agglomerates. If stem-loops embedded in more complex structures [as in tRNA (
6
-
8
) or the hammerhead ribozyme (
9
-
11
) or in complexes with proteins (see for example
12
,
13
)] are disregarded, then so far small RNA fragments capable of forming a stem-loop structure have largely been crystallized as the anti-symmetric dimers instead (
14
-
19
). Similarly, it is often observed by NMR methods that small stem-loops can exist in solution in equilibrium with duplex forms. It is
therefore very desirable to establish procedures for obtaining defined stem-loops and to have a method for rapid testing of whether such a form has been
obtained prior to an extensive X-ray or NMR study. In this paper we assess the question of distinguishing a
stem-loop from an anti-symmetric duplex in both the liquid and crystalline states of an
RNA fragment by NMR spectroscopy. This study provides data for assessing the
structure adopted by the E-domain in the full 5S rRNA molecule, as well as kinetic data relevant to
whether conversion between the two proposed forms of 5S rRNA is likely to be of
functional importance. From the results of the present study, conclusions are
also drawn regarding procedures which may help in obtaining stem-loop forms in crystals.
1
H NMR spectra of the exchangeable protons were acquired on a Varian 600 MHz
Unityplus and on a Bruker AMX600 spectrometer using either the jump-return (
20
) or the 1331 (
21
,
22
) water suppression sequences with the carrier frequency at the water resonance
and the excitation maximum at 12.5 p.p.m. Preparatory experiments (not using
crystallized material) were performed to monitor the dependence of the
1
H spectrum of the
E.coli
5S rRNA E-domain on RNA concentration, NaCl concentration, temperature, pH and on the cooling rate used for the folding
procedure. This allowed observation of the spectra from the stem-loop and duplex species possible for this fragment. In the following
discussion, `slowly cooled' and `quickly cooled' during the folding represent a
temperature change from 75 to 25oC by slow cooling of a water bath over 4 h and a fast quench from 75 to 0oC by placing the sample in an ice bath, respectively. A 2D NOE
spectrum of nearly exclusively the monomer form was acquired with a quickly
cooled 0.7 mM sample in 90% H
2
O, 10% D
2
O, pH 6.5, 10 mM phosphate buffer and 50 [mu]M EDTA on a Bruker AMX600 spectrometer at 2oC. Water suppression was achieved by replacing every
1
H pulse of the standard NOESY pulse sequence by a jump-return unit. Phase-sensitive detection in
t
1
was done via the TPPI method. A corresponding experiment for a quickly cooled
0.85 mM monomer/dimer mixture was performed at 27oC in the same NMR buffer, except for the addition of NaCl to a
concentration of 150 mM.
In NMR studies of short oligoribonucleotides it is commonly observed that both
monomeric stem-loops as well as dimeric duplexes can exist in solution. Under
appropriate experimental conditions (buffer and temperature) it is often
possible to resolve resonances, especially from imino hydrogens of guanine and
uridine, which are characteristic of these two species. The goals of the
present paper were to use these NMR characteristics to test whether monomeric
or dimeric species exist in both the liquid and crystalline states of the E-domain fragment of
E.coli
5S rRNA and to obtain NMR data which can be used to test whether a stem-loop conformation exists in the full 5S rRNA molecule. For the latter
test, chemical shifts and NOEs for the imino hydrogens of G and U provide an
appropriate comparison. For the crystals this involves dissolution in an
appropriate NMR buffer, immediately acquiring an NMR spectrum and comparing
this spectrum with predefined monomer and dimer spectra in solution. A further
requirement of this procedure is that the kinetics of conversion between the
monomer and dimer species are slow compared with the time required to dissolve
the crystals and record the NMR spectrum.
The distribution between monomeric and dimeric forms of the E-domain in solution is strongly influenced by both total concentration and
the thermal procedure used to produce the NMR sample. This can be used to
identify NMR resonances arising from each species. For example, a slowly cooled
0.85 mM sample of the E-domain (Fig.
1
a) shows a substantial intensity for two sets of resonances which can be shown
to arise from monomer and dimer species. The proportion of resonances arising
from the monomeric stem-loop can be increased by rapid cooling of the sample (Fig.
1
b) or by slow cooling of a more dilute sample (Fig.
1
c). For rapid cooling of a 0.17 mM sample, the NMR spectrum shows almost
exclusively resonances from the monomeric stem-loop (Fig.
1
d).
This interpretation of the observed spectra has been confirmed by means of NOE
results. A NOESY spectrum (Fig.
2
b) recorded at 2oC for a sample almost exclusively in the putative monomeric form allowed
all 10 expected imino resonances (Fig.
2
a) of the hairpin stem to be observed and assigned. As is usual in NMR spectra
of stem-loops, the imino hydrogens of the loop uridines (Fig.
1
) were not observed, presumably as a consequence of rapid exchange with solvent
water. A schematic summary of the NOE connectivities involving the exchangeable protons of this monomer form is given in Figure
2
c and indicates the formation of a typical double helix in the stem. A
comparison of the chemical shifts of the putative monomer and dimer imino
resonances (Fig.
1
a) shows that corresponding imino signals have very similar chemical shifts
between the termini of the molecules and the G84-C92 base pair, whereas pronounced differences, together with the
appearance of additional resonances for the duplex form, occur for the
remaining imino signals in nt 85-91. The NOESY spectrum of the sample in Figure
1
b recorded at 27oC (data not shown) shows additional cross-peaks which link the two dimer resonances at 10.9 and 11.3 p.p.m. and
also connect each of them to the dimer line at 13.4 p.p.m. The signals at 10.9
and 11.3 p.p.m. can be attributed to formation of a U87-U89 base pair in the dimeric form (Fig.
1
), with both of the U87, U89 imino hydrogens showing a sequential cross-peak to the G86 imino hydrogen at 13.4 p.p.m. A U87-U89 base pair would have a very short imino-imino hydrogen distance of <3 Å and, concomitant with this, the U87-U89 NOE cross-peaks were amongst the strongest in the
NOE spectrum (as indicated in Figure
2
, this cross-peak can even be observed for the residual dimer present in the largely
monomeric sample used to record Figure
2
). It is of interest that the palindromic duplex appears to be able to
accomodate two U-U base pairs in the bulge region (insert to Fig.
1
) with only very minor alterations to the flanking stems. This latter NOE
spectrum was acquired at 27oC because, in contrast to the monomer signals, the dimer lines broaden
considerably upon decreasing the temperature. An important characteristic of
the NMR spectra recorded at 27oC is that at this temperature resonances which arise exclusively from the
monomeric stem-loop or from the dimeric duplex can be readily observed (Fig.
1
a).
Figure
Slow cooling of samples of the E-domain of
E.coli
5S rRNA is presumed to yield near equilibrium monomer-dimer distributions in solution. From slow cooling experiments at different concentrations, we estimate an equilibrium constant
K
d
of ~10
-4
mol/l for dissociation of the E-domain dimer in 150 mM NaCl, 10 mM sodium phosphate buffer, pH 6.5, at 27oC. Non-equilibrium distributions have been produced by rapid cooling (excess
monomer) or by dilution of concentrated samples (excess dimer). NMR spectra
recorded at both 10 and 27oC showed that there was only very slow alteration in the spectra over
several weeks, indicating that both dimerization of monomeric stem-loops as well as dissociation of dimers to form stem-loops is a very slow process for this molecule under these
conditions. It has been proposed that the function of 5S rRNA might involve
conversion between so-called A-form (E-domain in a stem-loop) and B-form (E-domain forming a duplex with the C-domain) under the influence of
proteins which bind to the RNA molecule (
23
). This would involve a third conformational form for the E-domain sequence. The present evidence for the very slow interconversion of
monomers and dimers for this RNA sequence suggests that if such a process
occurs, catalysis of the interconversion between A- and B-forms, presumably as a consequence of bound proteins, would be
required. By comparison of the data contained in the NOE spectrum of the
monomeric form of the isolated E-domain (Fig.
2
) with a 3D
15
N-edited NOE spectrum of [
15
N]G,U-labelled
E.coli
5S rRNA, we have recently been able to obtain strong evidence that the stem-loop observed for the monomeric E-domain is also present in the A-form of the complete
E.coli
5S rRNA (
24
).
To test for the form of the E-domain present in crystals, an imino proton spectrum of the E-domain crystals recorded immediately after rapidly dissolving them
in NMR buffer is presented in Figure
3
b. Comparison with the signals of nearly exclusively the dimeric (slowly cooled
2.5 mM sample; Fig.
3
a) and the monomeric (quickly cooled 0.05 mM sample; Fig.
3
c) forms clearly demonstrates the existence of dimers in the crystalline state.
The spectrum of Figure
3
b is the sum of five individual experiments which did not show any time-dependent changes during the time covered by acquisition of the NMR data
(9.6 h). After storing the sample of the dissolved crystals at 27oC for 6 days, a spectrum identical to Figure
3
b was again obtained. This indicates that residual amounts of crystallization
buffer contained in this sample did not alter the previously observed slow
dimer-monomer interconversion. It may be noted that because of the downfield
chemical shift of the imino hydrogen resonances in the NMR spectrum, the
presence of residual crystallization buffer did not interfere with recording of
the imino hydrogen spectra and that it is in principle possible to also
determine the state of the oligonucleotide when dissolved in the
crystallization buffer. Figure
3
d shows the spectrum of the dissolved crystal sample after heating to 75oC and rapid cooling to 0oC. As expected for the RNA concentration of 0.12 mM, this procedure
results in the appearance of nearly pure monomer resonances.
We have shown that the E-domain of
E.coli
5S rRNA can exist as both a stem-loop and as a duplex with two U-U base pairs in the bulge region. Furthermore, by manipulation of
folding conditions, it was possible to obtain predominantly monomeric or
dimeric forms in solution and to show that interconversion between these forms
was very slow. The spectra recorded for the monomeric stem-loop provide NMR data which have been used to obtain evidence for a stem-loop in the full 5S rRNA molecule (
24
) and the slow kinetic interconversion indicates that if transitions between A-form and B-form 5S rRNA are functionally important, this will need to be a catalyzed process.
The present results also indicate that NMR spectroscopy can be used to decide
whether oligonucleotides crystallize as monomeric stem-loops or dimeric duplexes. Besides the identification of a stem-loop and a duplex subspectrum in preparatory experiments, the only
condition for this method to be applicable is a slow interconversion between
the two species. Our experience with the
E.coli
E-domain and also with similar oligoribonucleotides is that a slow
interchange with a time scale of weeks to months exists for stem-loops typically consisting of about eight or more base pairs. Whereas
there has been a tendency to regard slow cooling of samples as appropriate for
obtaining native RNA structures during crystallization attempts, if one is
interested in the stem-loop form, it may be advantageous to rapidly cool the crystallization
batches to favor the monomeric form before starting the crystallization. If
necessary, the stem of the hairpin species could be extended by some base pairs
in order to further slow down the monomer-dimer conversion. Unlike X-ray investigations, the NMR method does not require a minimal size
or high diffractive resolution of the crystals. Instead, small or even
imperfect crystals, which will be produced anyhow during screening for
appropriate crystallization conditions, can be used. Furthermore, very little
material is required and the NMR experiment is simple to perform. In our case,
only 7 nmol of oligonucleotide, corresponding to 42 [mu]g of E-domain crystals, was sufficient to acquire the decisive spectrum. In
order to obtain a crystal structure for the stem-loop form of the E-domain, we are currently using NMR spectroscopy to check whether
various folding protocols and crystallization buffers lead to predominantly stem-loop conformations of the E-domain in the crystallization buffer and in the resulting crystals.
This work was supported by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, the Deutsche Agentur für Raumfahrt and the Fonds der Chemischen Industrie e. V. We thank R.Bald and K.Beyer for synthesis of the
synthons.

REFERENCES
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