Bioinformatics characterization of growth differentiation factor 11 of Oryctolagus cuniculus

Growth differentiation factor 11 (gdf11) is a member of the transforming growth factor-β (tgf-β) superfamily and acts as a regulator for the aging of multiple tissues. the mature forms of human gdf11 and gdf8 show more than 90% sequence identity but the role of gdf11 is not well understood. for detail annotation of gdf11 from oryctolagus cuniculus,the mature segment of gdf11 was analyzed using different bioinformatics online tools for its physicochemical properties and secondary structure predictions. multiple tools for secondary structure prediction were used and the information about rabbit gdf11 given by these tools was compared. it was observed that all tools gave different information regarding properties of gdf11 secondary structure and concluded that no tool is perfect for prediction and multiple tools should be tried for protein secondary structure prediction. the final prediction should be manually selected which could be supported by tertiary structure prediction of protein. for phylogeny four closest homologous proteins of tgf-β superfamily were selected i.e. gdf11,gdf8,inhibin and bone morphogenetic protein 7 (bmp7). ten sequences of each protein from same mammals were retrieved from genpept database and included in the phylogenetic analysis to show evolutionary relatedness among these proteins. all selected proteins were resolved in the tree and appeared in their respective clusters. it was confirmed from the phylogenetic tree that gdf11 and gdf8 are paralogs of each other as both proteins are appeared to be derived from a common ancestor in the tree. findings of this study will help to understand the interactions of rabbit gdf11 with different ligands and molecular details of how these interactions could be reached. © 2017 chemical society of pakistan. all rights reserved.