Structural and Thermodynamic Characteristics of cHLH Peptide and cHLH/HDM2 Complex

Tumor suppressor protein p53 loses its function upon binding with the HDM2 protein, and inhibiting the p53-HDM2 interaction is critical to suppress tumor cell growth. Recently, the cyclized helix-loop-helix peptide (cHLH) mimicking the ${\alpha}-helix$ part of the p53 protein has been designed and found to exhibit high binding affinity with HDM2. Here, we report the structural and thermodynamic characteristics of the bound complex of the cHLH peptide with the HDM2 protein. We performed molecular dynamics simulations to investigate the structural features of the cHLH peptide as well as its complex with the HDM2. The binding free energy calculation based on the integral equation theory was also executed to quantify the binding affinity for the cHLH/HDM2 complex and to understand the factors contributing to the binding affinity. We found a variety of factors for the helix stability of the cHLH peptide as well as in the complexation with the HDM2, which may provide an insight into the development of anti-cancer drug designs.