The Mura lab employs experimental and computational approaches to understand the structure, function/dynamics, and evolution of RNA- and DNA-based protein assemblies. In particular, we seek a deeper understanding of ribonucleoprotein (RNP) assemblies – What these protein/RNA complexes look like at atomic resolution (structure), their assembly pathways and dynamical behavior (function), and the interrelationships between Sm and Sm-like systems (evolution).

Discovered as the antigens in the autoimmune disease lupus, Sm proteins are now known to form a broad, evolutionarily-conserved family that play key roles in most aspects of RNA metabolism (including mRNA splicing), as well as in bacterial cell-cell communication networks ("quorum sensing"). Sm-based complexes such as the spliceosome exceed the ribosome in terms of both size and architectural complexity, thereby providing an immensely rich area for ongoing studies. Current work focuses on Sm systems drawn from both a well-established context (splicing) and a more recently emerging area (quorum sensing) that is of major biomedical significance because of its involvement in biofilm-mediated bacterial pathogenesis. The research program being developed to pursue this work is necessarily highly interdisciplinary, relying particularly heavily on methods from structural biology (e.g., crystallography) and computational chemistry (e.g., molecular dynamics simulations), in addition to traditional wet-lab biochemistry.

1. Oxyanion-Mediated Inhibition of Serine Proteases
   Steven R. Presnell, Girish S. Patil, Cameron Mura, Kevin M. Jude, Jennifer M. Conley, Jay A. Bertrand, Chih-Min Kam, James C. Powers, & Loren Dean Williams.*
   Biochemistry (1998), 37, 17068–17081.
   
2. The Crystal Structure of a Heptameric Archaeal Sm Protein: Implications for the Sm Core of Eukaryotic SnRNPs
   Cameron Mura, Duilio Cascio, Michael R. Sawaya, & David Eisenberg.*
   Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA (2001), 98, 5532–5537.
   
   Popular scientific coverage:
   Science Magazine "Editors' Choice" (18 May 2001) – Molecular Biology: At the Core of Splicing
   Cover of Fall 2001 ACA Newsletter (upper left)
3. Structure of a Nudix Protein from Pyrobaculum aerophilum Reveals a Dimer with Two Intersubunit β-Sheets
   Shuishu Wang, Cameron Mura, Michael R. Sawaya, & David Eisenberg.*
   Acta Crystallographica Section D (2002), 58, 571–578.
   
4. Structure and Function of an Archaeal Homolog of Survival Protein E (SurEα): An Acid Phosphatase with Purine Nucleotide Specificity
   Cameron Mura, Jonathan E. Katz, Steven G. Clarke, & David Eisenberg.*
   Journal of Molecular Biology (2003), 326(5), 1559–1575.
   (Supplementary Materials [PDF]; Erratum [HTML, PDF])
5. The Oligomerization and Ligand-binding Properties of Sm-like Archaeal Proteins (SmAPs)
   Cameron Mura, Anna Kozhukhovsky, Mari Gingery, Martin Phillips, & David Eisenberg.*
   Protein Science (2003), 12, 832–847.
   
   Popular scientific coverage:
   Cover Illustration
   2003 PDB Holiday Postcard
   2003 PDB Annual Report (see last page)
   Cover Illustration of "Protein Crystallography" book by Lattman & Loll (2008)
   
6. Structure and Assembly of an Augmented Sm-like Archaeal Protein 14-mer
   Cameron Mura, Martin Phillips, Anna Kozhukhovsky, & David Eisenberg.*
   Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA (2003), 100(8), 4539–4544.
   
7. Three-dimensional Structures of Fibrillar Sm Proteins: Hfq and Other Sm-like Proteins
   Véronique Arluison,^†∗ Cameron Mura,^† Maria Romero-Guzmán, Jean Liquier, Olivier Pellegrini, Mari Gingery, Philippe Régnier, & Sergio Marco.
   Journal of Molecular Biology (2006), 356(1), 86–96.
   (Supplementary Materials [PDF])
   Popular scientific coverage:
   2006 San Diego Supercomputer Center (SDSC) Wall Calendar
   2004 PDB Holiday Postcard (not from my work, but same Sm-like protein that was part of this study)
   
8. Sm-like Protein Hfq: Location of the ATP-binding Site and the Effect of ATP on Hfq•RNA Complexes
   Véronique Arluison, Shravan K. Mutyam, Cameron Mura, Sergio Marco, & Maxim V. Sukhodolets.*
   Protein Science (2007), 16, 1830–1841.
   
9. Molecular Dynamics of a κB DNA Element: Base Flipping via Cross-strand Intercalative Stacking in a Microsecond-scale Simulation
   Cameron Mura,* & J. Andrew McCammon.
   In press (2008); preprint available at http://arxiv.org/abs/0807.1375v2
   

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