Kun Karnchanapandh. Bezlotoxumab binding specificity to toxin b of Clostridium difficile. Master's Degree(Bioinformatics and Computational Biology). Chulalongkorn University. Office of Academic Resources. : Chulalongkorn University, 2569.
Bezlotoxumab binding specificity to toxin b of Clostridium difficile
Abstract:
Clostridioides difficile infection (CDI) is one of the significant global health issues. Toxin B is the main target protein preventing CDI recurrence. Clinical research has shown that bezlotoxumab (Bez), a monoclonal antibody designed to prevent CDI recurrences, is less effective against the B2 strain compared to the B1 strain, resulting in a high recurrence rate. Bez functions by binding to the epitope 1 and 2 regions in the combined repetitive oligopeptide (CROP) domain. Some binding residues are distinctively different between B1 and B2 strains. In this work, our goal was to understand and compare the interaction of toxins B1 and B2 in complex with Bez, using molecular dynamics (MD) simulations and binding free energy calculations. Which in turn will be used to improve the binding of Bez to toxin B2 through a combination of computational simulations and mutational analyses. The predicted ΔGbinding values affirmed that Bez could bind to toxin B1 significantly better than B2, mainly due to electrostatic interactions. The residues with importance for Bez binding were E1878, T1901, E1902, F1905, N1941, V1946, N2031, T2032, E2033, V2076, V2077, and E2092. The reduced inhibition of Bez against toxin B2 was mainly due to a change in residue E2033A and the loss of contributions from E1878 and E1902, as identified by the intermolecular interaction changes from the dynamic residue interaction network (dRIN) analysis. Several mutations in Bez that significantly improved binding to toxin B2 were identified, comprising S28R, S31W/K, Y32R, S56W, and G103D/S in the heavy chain (Hc), and S32F/H/R/W/Y in the light chain (Lc). These mutations also established critical protein-protein interaction with toxin B2. By utilizing molecular dynamics simulations, it was observed that several single mutations, including HcS28R, LcS32H, LcS32R, LcS32W, and LcS32Y, demonstrated greater binding affinities to toxin B2 when compared to the wild-type Bez. The Coulombic interactions acted as the main attribution for these enhanced binding. To further improve the binding affinities to toxin B2, the mutation HcS28R were combined with four different mutations at residue LcS32 resulting in even greater binding affinities in double mutants, especially HcS28R/LcS32H, HcS28R/LcS32R, and HcS28R/LcS32Y.The per-residue decomposition analyses stressed the importance of specific residues playing a significant role in enhancing binding interactions, focusing on the contribution of electrostatic interactions. These discoveries strengthen our understanding of Bezs interaction with toxin B, providing insights into rational Bez mutant design for improved toxin B2 binding, and offer a basis for the development of more efficient antibodies to counteract toxin B2 and related infections.