Protein - Structure, Function, Amino Acids | Britannica (2025)

Collagen

Collagen is the structural protein of bones, tendons, ligaments, and skin. For many years collagen was considered to be insoluble in water. Part of the collagen of calf skin, however, can be extracted with citrate buffer at pH 3.7. A precursor of collagen called procollagen is converted in the body into collagen. Procollagen has a molecular weight of 120,000. Cleavage of one or a few peptide bonds of procollagen yields collagen, which has three subunits, each with a molecular weight of 95,000; therefore, the molecular weight of collagen is 285,000 (3 × 95,000). The three subunits are wound as spirals around an elongated straight axis. The length of each subunit is 2,900 angstroms, and its diameter is approximately 15 angstroms. The three chains are staggered, so that the trimer has no definite terminal limits.

Collagen differs from all other proteins in its high content of proline and hydroxyproline. Hydroxyproline does not occur in significant amounts in any other protein except elastin. Most of the proline in collagen is present in the sequence glycine–proline-X, in which X is frequently alanine or hydroxyproline. Collagen does not contain cystine or tryptophan and therefore cannot substitute for other proteins in the diet. The presence of proline causes kinks in the peptide chain and thus reduces the length of the amino acid unit from 3.7 angstroms in the extended chain of the β-structure to 2.86 angstroms in the collagen chain. In the intertwined triple helix, the glycines are inside, close to the axis; the prolines are outside.

Native collagen resists the action of trypsin but is hydrolyzed by the bacterial enzyme collagenase. When collagen is boiled with water, the triple helix is destroyed, and the subunits are partially hydrolyzed; the product is gelatin. The unfolded peptide chains of gelatin trap large amounts of water, resulting in a hydrated molecule.

When collagen is treated with tannic acid or with chromium salts, cross links form between the collagen fibers, and it becomes insoluble; the conversion of hide into leather is based on this tanning process. The tanned material is insoluble in hot water and cannot be converted to gelatin. On exposure to water at 62° to 63° C (144° to 145° F), however, the cross links formed by the tanning agents collapse, and the leather contracts irreversibly to about one-third its original volume.

Collagen seems to undergo an aging process in living organisms that may be caused by the formation of cross links between collagen fibers. They are formed by the conversion of some lysine side chains to aldehydes (compounds with the general structure RCHO), and the combination of the aldehydes with the ε-amino groups of intact lysine side chains. The protein elastin, which occurs in the elastic fibers of connective tissue, contains similar cross links and may result from the combination of collagen fibers with other proteins. When cross-linked collagen or elastin is degraded, products of the cross-linked lysine fragments, called desmosins and isodesmosins, are formed.