In silico analysis of the α-amylase family GH57: eventual subfamilies reflecting enzyme specificities

Glycoside hydrolases (GHs) have been classified in the CAZy database into 153 GH families. Currently, there might be four alpha-amylase families: the main family GH13, the family GH57 with related GH119 and, eventually, also GH126. The family GH57 was established in 1996 as the second and smaller a-amylase family. In addition to alpha-amylase, it contains 4-alpha-glucanotransferase, alpha-glucan branching enzyme, amylopullulanase, dual-specificity amylopullulanase-cyclomaltodextrinase, non-specified amylase, maltogenic amylase and alpha-galactosidase. The family GH57 enzymes employ the retaining reaction mechanism, share five typical conserved sequence regions and possess catalytic (beta/alpha)(7)-barrel succeeded by a fourhelix bundle with the catalytic machinery consisting of catalytic nucleophile and proton donor (glutamic acid and aspartic acid at strands beta 4 and beta 7, respectively). The present bioinformatics study delivers a detailed sequence comparison of 1602 family GH57 sequences with the aim to highlight the uniqueness of each enzyme's specificity and all eventual protein groups. This was achieved by creating the evolutionary tree focused on both the enzyme specificities and taxonomical origin. The substantial increase of numbers of sequences from recent comparisons done more than 5 years ago has allowed to refine the details of the sequence logos for the individual enzyme specificities. The study identifies a new evolutionary distinct group of alpha-galactosidase-related enzymes with until-now-undefined enzyme specificity but positioned on the evolutionary tree on a branch adjacent to alpha-galactosidases. The specificity of alpha-galactosidase is, moreover, the only one of the entire family GH57 for which there is no structural support for the proposal of the proton donor based on sequence analysis. The analysis also suggests a few so-called like protein groups related to some family GH57 enzyme specificities but lacking one or both catalytic residues.