A Simple Calixarene Recognizes Post‐translationally Methylated Lysine

Pinning the tail: The post-translational methylation of proteins governs important biochemical pathways, including many involved in gene regulation and cancer. We report here on the ability of the well known p-sulfonatocalix[4]arene to bind strongly to trimethyllysine with good selectivity over all other cationic side chains (see figure), including post-translationally methylated Arg. We also find that it binds with good site selectively and low μM affinity to the Lys(Me3) residue on a representative histone tail peptide.