Divining the serpin inhibition mechanism: a suicide substrate ‘springe’?

The most important of diverse serpin functions is serine-protease inhibition. In contrast to the ‘standard-mechanism’ inhibitors, inhibitory serpins use a mechanism that involves unusual flexibility, and cofactor and receptor interactions. The principal feature is a refolding step, during which a disordered or helical strand is inserted into the center of a β sheet. This transition, which is essential for inhibition, can be induced by heating, proteolytic cleavage of the serpin, or complexation with the proteinase target; analogous transitions can be induced by peptide complexation or aggregation. Although it is difficult to determine the details of this mechanism, information derived from crystal structures and other experiments has stimulated drug design efforts with wide-ranging potential applications.