Nuclear magnetic resonance determination of metal-proton distances in a synthetic calcium binding site of rabbit skeletal troponin C.

The binding of gadolinium to a synthetic peptide of 13 amino acid residues representing the calcium binding loop of site 3 of rabbit skeletal troponin C [AcSTnC(103-115)amide] has been studied by using proton nuclear magnetic resonance (1H NMR) spectroscopy. In particular, the proton line broadening and enhanced spin-lattice relaxation have been used to determine proton-metal ion distances for several assigned nuclei in the peptide-metal ion complex. These distances have been used in conjunction with other constraints and a distance algorithm procedure to demonstrate that the structure of the peptide-metal complex as shown by 1H NMR is consistent with the structure of the EF calcium binding loop in the X-ray structure of parvalbumin but that the available 1H NMR distances do not uniquely define the solution structure.