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A discrete water exit pathway in the membrane protein cytochrome c oxidase.

ABSTRACT: By using the non-redox-active Mg2+/Mn2+ site of cytochrome c oxidase as a probe, water access from the outside of the enzyme and water escape from the buried active site were studied. Water movement was time-resolved by monitoring the magnetic interaction of the oxygen isotope 17O with the Mn2+ by using a rapid freeze-quench-electron spin echo envelope modulation technique. Rapid (msec) access of water from the bulk phase to the Mn2+ was demonstrated by mixing cytochrome c oxidase with H217O. To determine whether a channel involving the Mn2+ was used for water exit from the active site, samples incubated in 17O2 were allowed to turn over approximately five times before freezing. The 17O, now in the form of H217O, was detected at the Mn2+. The significant broadening of the Mn2+ signal after the limited number of turnovers strongly suggests that the water exits the protein by means of one discrete pathway, not by random diffusion.

SUBMITTER: Schmidt B

PROVIDER: S-EPMC307603 | biostudies-literature | 2003 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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A discrete water exit pathway in the membrane protein cytochrome c oxidase.

Schmidt Bryan B McCracken John J Ferguson-Miller Shelagh S

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 20031205 26

By using the non-redox-active Mg2+/Mn2+ site of cytochrome c oxidase as a probe, water access from the outside of the enzyme and water escape from the buried active site were studied. Water movement was time-resolved by monitoring the magnetic interaction of the oxygen isotope 17O with the Mn2+ by using a rapid freeze-quench-electron spin echo envelope modulation technique. Rapid (msec) access of water from the bulk phase to the Mn2+ was demonstrated by mixing cytochrome c oxidase with H217O. To ...[more]

PMID: 14660787

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Project description:Cytochrome c oxidase (CytcO), the final electron acceptor in the respiratory chain, catalyzes the reduction of O(2) to H(2)O while simultaneously pumping protons across the inner mitochondrial or bacterial membrane to maintain a transmembrane electrochemical gradient that drives, for example, ATP synthesis. In this work mutations that were predicted to alter proton translocation and enzyme activity in preliminary computational studies are characterized with extensive experimental and computational analysis. The mutations were introduced in the D pathway, one of two proton-uptake pathways, in CytcO from Rhodobacter sphaeroides . Serine residues 200 and 201, which are hydrogen-bonded to crystallographically resolved water molecules halfway up the D pathway, were replaced by more bulky hydrophobic residues (Ser200Ile, Ser200Val/Ser201Val, and Ser200Val/Ser201Tyr) to query the effects of changing the local structure on enzyme activity as well as proton uptake, release, and intermediate transitions. In addition, the effects of these mutations on internal proton transfer were investigated by blocking proton uptake at the pathway entrance (Asp132Asn replacement in addition to the above-mentioned mutations). Even though the overall activities of all mutant CytcO's were lowered, both the Ser200Ile and Ser200Val/Ser201Val variants maintained the ability to pump protons. The lowered activities were shown to be due to slowed oxidation kinetics during the P(R) ? F and F ? O transitions (P(R) is the "peroxy" intermediate formed at the catalytic site upon reaction of the four-electron-reduced CytcO with O(2), F is the oxoferryl intermediate, and O is the fully oxidized CytcO). Furthermore, the P(R) ? F transition is shown to be essentially pH independent up to pH 12 (i.e., the apparent pK(a) of Glu286 is increased from 9.4 by at least 3 pK(a) units) in the Ser200Val/Ser201Val mutant. Explicit simulations of proton transport in the mutated enzymes revealed that the solvation dynamics can cause intriguing energetic consequences and hence provide mechanistic insights that would never be detected in static structures or simulations of the system with fixed protonation states (i.e., lacking explicit proton transport). The results are discussed in terms of the proton-pumping mechanism of CytcO.

Dataset Information

A discrete water exit pathway in the membrane protein cytochrome c oxidase.

Publications

A discrete water exit pathway in the membrane protein cytochrome c oxidase.

Similar Datasets

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