The structure of a highly conserved picocyanobacterial protein reveals a Tudor domain with a novel tRNA binding function

Cyanobacteria of the Prochlorococcus and marine Synechococcus genera are the most abundant photosynthetic microbes in the ocean. Intriguingly, the genomes of these bacteria are very divergent even within each genus, both in gene content and at amino acid level of the encoded proteins. One striking exception to this is a 62 amino acid protein, termed Prochlorococcus/Synechococcus Hyper Conserved Protein (PSHCP). PSHCP is not only found in all sequenced Prochlorococcus and marine Synechococcus genomes but it is also nearly 100% identical in its amino acid sequence across all sampled genomes. Such universal distribution and sequence conservation suggests an essential cellular role of the encoded protein in these bacteria. However, the function of PSHCP is unknown. We used Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) spectroscopy to determine its structure. We found that 52 of the 62 amino acids in PSHCP form a Tudor domain, while the remainder of the protein is disordered. NMR titration experiments revealed that PSHCP has only a weak affinity for DNA, but an 18.5 fold higher affinity for tRNA, hinting at an involvement of PSHCP in translation. Computational docking and mutagenesis studies identified a positively charged patch surrounding residue K30 that serves as the primary docking site for tRNA on PSHCP. These results provide the first insight into the structure and function of PSHCP and suggest a new function for Tudor domains in recognizing tRNA.