Nature is remarkably opportunistic in molding existing proteins to meet the needs of an organism. Hemoglobins provide a fascinating case study of this process. It is now clear that the traditional role ascribed to hemoglobins, that of oxygen transport by circulating hemoglobins, is but one of the functions carried out by members of this superfamily that are united by a similar fold. Recent studies provide strong evidence in favor of primordial hemoglobins functioning as nitric-oxide dioxygenases (1), an activity of considerable importance in present day hemoglobins and myoglobins (2–4).
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Royer et al. (2005) studied this question.
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