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Disruption of a putative intersubunit electrostatic bond enhances agonist efficacy at the human ?1 glycine receptor.

ABSTRACT: Partial agonists have lower efficacies than compounds considered 'full agonists', eliciting submaximal responses even at saturating concentrations. Taurine is a partial agonist at the glycine receptor (GlyR), a member of the cys-loop ligand-gated ion channel superfamily. The molecular mechanisms responsible for agonism are not fully understood but evidence suggests that efficacy at these receptors is determined by conformational changes that occur early in the process of receptor activation. We previously identified a residue located near the human ?1 glycine binding site (aspartate-97; D97) that, when mutated to arginine (D97R), results in GlyR channels opening spontaneously with a high open probability, mimicking the effects of saturating glycine concentrations on wildtype GlyR. This D97 residue is hypothesized to form an electrostatic interaction with arginine-119 on an adjacent subunit, stabilizing the channel in a shut state. Here we demonstrate that the disruption of this putative bond increases the efficacy of partial agonists including taurine, as well as two other ?-amino acid partial agonists, ?-aminobutyric acid (?-ABA) and ?-aminoisobutyric acid (?-AIBA). Even the subtle charge-conserving mutation of D97 to glutamate (D97E) markedly affects partial agonist efficacy. Mutation to the neutral alanine residue in the D97A mutant mimics the effects seen with D97R, indicating that charge repulsion does not significantly affect these findings. Our findings suggest that the determination of efficacy following ligand binding to the glycine receptor may involve the disruption of an intersubunit electrostatic interaction occurring near the agonist binding site.

SUBMITTER: Welsh BT

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5303145 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Disruption of a putative intersubunit electrostatic bond enhances agonist efficacy at the human α1 glycine receptor.

Welsh Brian T BT Todorovic Jelena J Kirson Dean D Allen Hunter M HM Bayly Michelle D MD Mihic S John SJ

Brain research 20161205

Partial agonists have lower efficacies than compounds considered 'full agonists', eliciting submaximal responses even at saturating concentrations. Taurine is a partial agonist at the glycine receptor (GlyR), a member of the cys-loop ligand-gated ion channel superfamily. The molecular mechanisms responsible for agonism are not fully understood but evidence suggests that efficacy at these receptors is determined by conformational changes that occur early in the process of receptor activation. We ...[more]

PMID: 27923639

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Project description:Many pentameric ligand-gated ion channels are modulated by extracellular pH. Glycine receptors (GlyRs) share this property, but it is not well understood how they are affected by pH changes. Whole cell experiments on HEK293 cells expressing zebrafish homomeric α1 GlyR confirmed previous reports that acidic pH (6.4) reduces GlyR sensitivity to glycine, whereas alkaline pH (8.4) has small or negligible effects. In addition to that, at pH 6.4 we observed a reduction in the maximum responses to the partial agonists β-alanine and taurine relative to the full agonist glycine. In cell-attached single-channel recording, low pH reduced agonist efficacy, as the maximum open probability decreased from 0.97, 0.91 and 0.66 to 0.93, 0.57 and 0.34 for glycine, β-alanine and taurine, respectively, reflecting a threefold decrease in efficacy equilibrium constants for all three agonists. We also tested the effect of pH 6.4 in conditions that replicate those at the native synapse, recording outside-out currents elicited by fast application of millisecond pulses of agonists on α1 and α1β GlyR, at a range of intracellular chloride concentrations. Acidic pH reduced the area under the curve of the currents, by reducing peak amplitude, slowing activation and speeding deactivation. Our results show that acidification of the extracellular pH by one unit, as may occur in pathological conditions such as ischaemia, impairs GlyR gating and is likely to reduce the effectiveness of glycinergic synaptic inhibition. KEY POINTS: Extracellular pH in the central nervous system (CNS) is known to shift towards acidic values during pathophysiological conditions such as ischaemia and seizures. Acidic extracellular pH is known to affect GABAergic inhibitory synapses, but its effect on signals mediated by glycine receptors (GlyR) is not well characterised. Moderate acidic conditions (pH 6.4) reduce the maximum single channel open probability of recombinant homomeric GlyRs produced by the neurotransmitter glycine or other agonists, such as β-alanine and taurine. When glycine was applied with a piezoelectric stepper to outside out patches, to simulate its fast rise and short duration at the synapse, responses became shorter and smaller at pH 6.4. The effect was also observed with physiologically low intracellular chloride and in mammalian heteromeric GlyRs. This suggests that acidic pH is likely to reduce the strength of inhibitory signalling at glycinergic synapses.

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Disruption of a putative intersubunit electrostatic bond enhances agonist efficacy at the human ?1 glycine receptor.

Publications

Disruption of a putative intersubunit electrostatic bond enhances agonist efficacy at the human α1 glycine receptor.

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