Comment on:

Science. 2000 Jul 7;289(5476):23-6.

Activating mineralocorticoid receptor mutation in hypertension exacerbated by pregnancy.

Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Department of Genetics, Yale University School of Medicine, Boyer Center for Molecular Medicine, Room 154, 295 Congress Avenue, New Haven, CT 06510, USA.

Hypertension and pregnancy-related hypertension are major public health problems of largely unknown causes. We describe a mutation in the mineralocorticoid receptor (MR), S810L, that causes early-onset hypertension that is markedly exacerbated in pregnancy. This mutation results in constitutive MR activity and alters receptor specificity, with progesterone and other steroids lacking 21-hydroxyl groups, normally MR antagonists, becoming potent agonists. Structural and biochemical studies indicate that the mutation results in the gain of a van der Waals interaction between helix 5 and helix 3 that substitutes for interaction of the steroid 21-hydroxyl group with helix 3 in the wild-type receptor. This helix 5-helix 3 interaction is highly conserved among diverse nuclear hormone receptors, suggesting its general role in receptor activation.

PMID: 10884226 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]