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The Relationship between Size, Structure, and Function in Erythrocruorin
Author(s) -
Cabey John,
Arroyo Ashley,
Sai Aashish Babu,
Corpuz Seth,
Hoggard Ethan,
Huang Kaiyu,
Meng Qingqi,
Pidara Aneesha,
Rehman Iqra,
Sabah Clinton
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
the faseb journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.709
H-Index - 277
eISSN - 1530-6860
pISSN - 0892-6638
DOI - 10.1096/fasebj.31.1_supplement.lb271
Subject(s) - chemistry , biophysics , biology
Erythrocruorin is a large oxygen‐carrying protein, whose molecular mass is greater than 3.5 million Daltons. This protein is made by earthworms and there are several possible functional reasons why the earthworm erythrocruorin needs to be so large. First, it floats freely in the liquid that flows through their vascular system, and the large size may help qcreduce leakage of hemoglobin. Also, these complex erythrocruorin allow lots of opportunities for interaction between subunits. Finally, huge complexes like this are a way to pack a lot of functional sites into one particle, which can help keep the viscosity of the solution manageable while having a high concentration of sites. The importance of this protein is that since it can be used as a blood substitute in humans‐providing a medical advantage. Erythrocruorin is an effective blood substitute is because it resists oxidation and is very stable.