Identifying amino acid positions that determine the specific interaction of proteins with small molecule ligands, is required for search of pharmaceutical targets, drug design, and solution of other biotechnology problems. We studied applicability of an original method SPrOS (specificity projection on sequence) developed to recognize functionally significant positions in amino acid sequences. The method allows residues specific to functional subgroups to be determined within the protein family based on their local surroundings in amino acid sequences. The efficiency of the method has been estimated on the protein kinase family. The residues associated with the protein specificity to inhibitors have been predicted. The results have been verified using 3D structures of protein-ligand complexes. Three small molecule inhibitors have been tested. Residues predicted with SPrOS either in contacted the inhibitor or influenced the conformation of the ligand-binding area. Excluding close homologues from the studied set makes it possible to decrease the number of difficult to interpret positions. The expediency of this procedure was determined by the relationship between an inhibitory spectrum and phylogenic partition. Thus, the method efficiency has been confirmed by matching the prediction results with the protein 3D structures.
Keywords: local sequence similarity; protein kinase inhibitors; protein kinases; small molecule ligands of proteins; specific amino acid residues.