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site residues were found to coincide significantly with hinges. Interestingly, however, the
latter were not conserved. Lastly, hinges are also more likely to occur on the protein
surface than in the core.
A consistent picture of hinge residues is suggested. In this view, hinges often occur near
the active site, probably to participate in the bending motion needed for catalysis. The
tend to be small and avoid regions of secondary structure, seemingly to maximize
conformational freedom. They are hypermutable, possibly due to the fact that they occur
more often on the surface than in the core. These correlations yield insights into protein
flexibility and the structure-function relationship. Strong sequence-based hinge
prediction, however, remains a goal for future work.
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