Isoform specific phosphorylation of p53 by protein kinase CK1

The ability of three isoforms of protein kinase CK1 (α, γ1, and δ) to phosphorylate the N-terminal region of p53 has been assessed using either recombinant p53 or a synthetic peptide reproducing its 1–28 sequence. Both substrates are readily phosphoylated by CK1δ and CK1α, but not by the γ isoform. Affinity of full size p53 for CK1 is 3 orders of magnitude higher than that of its N-terminal peptide (Km 0.82 μM vs 1.51 mM). The preferred target is S20, whose phosphorylation critically relies on E17, while S6 is unaffected despite displaying the same consensus (E-x-x-S). Our data support the concept that non-primed phosphorylation of p53 by CK1 is an isoform-specific reaction preferentially affecting S20 by a mechanism which is grounded both on a local consensus and on a remote docking site mapped to the K221RQK224 loop according to modeling and mutational analysis.