Review of Structure Searching Methods:
Examples of Front Doors and Back Doors That We Tried

If a protein sequence already HAS a resolved structure: Front Door #1 Search the Entrez Structure directly for your term(s) of interest.   Example:  Search for: P53 Tumor Suppressor   Front Door #2 Search the Entrez Protein database and then "Display" the associated Structure records. Note: Any protein sequence that was extracted from a 3-D structure record will have a "Structure" option in its "Links" menu. Rather than opening the Links menu of each protein sequence in your search results, a quick way to find all the associated structure records is to use the "Structure Links" option in the "Display" menu near the top of the search results page. Example:  Search Entrez Protein for: P53 Tumor Suppressor Select "Structure Links" from the "Display" menu near the top of the search results page.   If a protein sequence DOES NOT HAVE a resolved structure: Back Door #1 Find similar protein sequences and see if any of them have a resolved 3-D structure. *   Example:  MLH1 (human colon cancer) retreive RefSeq Protein NP_000240, display "Related Sequences", and then "Structure Links" *   Back Door #2 Identify the conserved domain(s) in the protein of interest and view the 3-D structure of the domain(s).   Example:  PER2 (human period 2 protein) retreive RefSeq Protein NP_073728, display "Conserved Domains", and follow links for the PAS domain to display its 3-D structure   More "back doors" exist -- these are just examples. They simply shed light on possible structure of a protein of interest. The actual structure must of course be confirmed experimentally. * See footnote about a few different versions of Back Door #1 in the earlier slide on "Using the Back Doors".