Unique Heme Environmental Structures in Heme-regulated Proteins Using Heme as the Signaling Molecule

Abstract Heme is a typical and common prosthetic group for various types of proteins and is utilized for active centers in many biologically important processes in vivo. However, heme has also been shown to function as a signaling molecule that regulates the functions of proteins, suggesting that novel signaling cascades are mediated by heme. We focused on the spectroscopic characterization of such “heme-regulated” proteins, showing unique heme environmental structures.