Prediction and Biochemical Demonstration of a Catabolic Pathway for the Osmoprotectant Proline Betaine

Abstract

At least half of the extant protein annotations are incorrect, and the errors propagate as the number of genome sequences increases exponentially. A large-scale, multidisciplinary sequence- and structure-based strategy for functional assignment of bacterial enzymes of unknown function has demonstrated the pathway for catabolism of the osmoprotectant proline betaine.