Validation and correction of Zn–CysxHisy complexes

Many crystal structures in the Protein Data Bank contain zinc ions in a geometrically distorted tetrahedral complex with four Cys and/or His ligands. A method is presented to automatically validate and correct these zinc complexes. Analysis of the corrected zinc complexes shows that the average Zn–Cys distances and Cys–Zn–Cys angles are a function of the number of cysteines and histidines involved. The observed trends can be used to develop more context-sensitive targets for model validation and refinement.