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Archaeal Eukaryote-Like Serine/Threonine Protein Kinase Interacts with and Phosphorylates a Forkhead-Associated-Domain-Containing Protein

ABSTRACT Protein phosphorylation plays an important role in cell signaling. However, in the Archaea, little is known about which proteins are phosphorylated and which kinases are involved. In this study, we identified, for the first time, a typical eukaryote-like Ser/Thr protein kinase and its protein partner, a forkhead-associated (FHA)-domain-containing protein, from the archaeon Sulfolobus tokodaii strain 7. This protein kinase, ST1565, physically interacted with the FHA-domain-containing protein, ST0829, both in vivo and in vitro. ST1565 preferred Mn2+ as a cofactor for autophosphorylation and for substrate phosphorylation; the optimal temperature for this was 45°C, and the optimal pH was 5.5 to 7.5. The critical amino acid residues of the conserved FHA and kinase domain sites were identified by performing a series of mutation assays. Thr329 was part of a major activation site in the kinase, while Thr326 was a negative regulation site. Several mutants with amino acid substitutions in the conserved FHA domain sites of ST0829 did not physically interact with ST1565. A structural model for the FHA domain demonstrated that the mutation sites were located at the edge of the protein and thus were in the domain that potentially interacts with ST1565. This report describes pioneering work on the third domain of life, the Archaea, showing that a protein kinase interacts with and phosphorylates an FHA-domain-containing protein. Our data provide critical information on the structural or functional characteristics of archaeal proteins and could help increase our understanding of fundamental signaling mechanisms in all three domains of life.