Dataset Information

Wheat-germ aspartate transcarbamoylase. Purification and cold-lability.

ABSTRACT: 1. Aspartate transcarbamoylase was purified approx. 3000-fold from wheat (Triticum vulgare) germ in 15-20% yield. The product has a specific activity of 14 mumol/min per mg of protein and is approx. 90% pure. The purification scheme includes the use of biospecific "imphilyte" chromatography as described by Yon [Biochem.J.(1977) 161, 233-237]. The enzyme was passed successively through columns of CPAD [N-(3-carboxypropionyl)aminodecyl]-Sepharose in the absence and presence respectively of the ligands UMP and L-aspartate. In the second passage the enzyme was specifically displaced away from impurities with which it co-migrated in the first passage. These two steps contributed a factor of 80 to the overall purification. 2. The enzyme is slowly inactivated on dilution at 0 degrees C and pH 7.0, the inactivation being partially reversible. A detailed investigation of the temperature- and pH-dependence of the cold-inactivation suggested that it was initiated by the perturbation of the pKa values of groups with a moderately high and positive heat of ionization, which were tentatively identified as histidine residues. These findings support a new concept of cold-lability proposed by Bock, Gilbert & Frieden [Biochem. Biophys. Res. Commun. (1975) 66, 564-569].

SUBMITTER: Grayson JE

PROVIDER: S-EPMC1161552 | biostudies-other | 1979 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-other

ACCESS DATA

Similar Datasets

Project description:Treatment of 1 microM wheat-germ aspartate transcarbamoylase with 1 mM-pyridoxal 5'-phosphate caused a rapid loss of activity, concomitant with the formation of a Schiff base. Complete loss of activity occurred within 10 min when the Schiff base was reduced with a 100-fold excess of NaBH4. Concomitantly, one amino group per chain was modified. No further residues were modified in the ensuing 30 min. The kinetics of inactivation were examined under conditions where the Schiff base was reduced before assay. Inactivation was apparently first-order. The pseudo-first-order rate constant, kapp., showed a hyperbolic dependence upon the concentration of pyridoxal 5'-phosphate, suggesting that the enzyme first formed a non-covalent complex with the reagent, modification of a lysine then proceeding within this complex. Inactivation of the enzyme by pyridoxal was 20 times slower than that by pyridoxal 5'-phosphate, indicating that the phosphate group was important in forming the initial complex. Partial protection against pyridoxal phosphate was provided by the leading substrate, carbamoyl phosphate, and nearly complete protection was provided by the bisubstrate analogue, N-phosphonoacetyl-L-aspartate, and the ligand-pair carbamoyl phosphate plus succinate. Steady-state kinetic studies, under conditions that minimized inactivation, showed that pyridoxal 5'-phosphate was also a competitive inhibitor with respect to the leading substrate, carbamoyl phosphate. Pyridoxal 5'-phosphate therefore appears to be an active-site-directed reagent. A sample of the enzyme containing one reduced pyridoxyl group per chain was digested with trypsin, and the labelled peptide was isolated and shown to contain a single pyridoxyl-lysine residue. Partial sequencing around the labelled lysine showed little homology with the sequence surrounding lysine-84, an active-centre residue of the catalytic subunit of aspartate transcarbamoylase from Escherichia coli, whose reaction with pyridoxal 5'-phosphate shows many similarities to the results described in the present paper. Arguably the reactive lysine is conserved between the two enzymes whereas the residues immediately surrounding the lysine are not. The same conclusion has been drawn in a comparison of reactive histidine residues in the two enzymes [Cole & Yon (1986) Biochemistry 25, 7168-7174].

Project description:Ligand-mediated effects on the inactivation of pure wheat-germ aspartate transcarbamoylase by trypsin were examined. Inactivation was apparently first-order in all cases, and the effects of ligand concentration on the pseudo-first-order rate constant, k, were studied. Increase in k (labilization) was effected by carbamoyl phosphate, phosphate and the putative transition-state analogue, N-phosphonoacetyl-L-aspartate. Decrease in k (protection) was effected by the end-product inhibitor, UMP, and by the ligand pairs aspartate/phosphate and succinate/carbamoyl phosphate, but not by aspartate or succinate alone up to 10 mM. Except for protection by the latter ligand pairs, all other ligand-mediated effects were also observed on inactivation of the enzyme by Pronase and chymotrypsin. Ligand-mediated effects on the fragmentation of the polypeptide chain by trypsin were examined electrophoretically. Slight labilization of the chain was observed in the presence of carbamoyl phosphate, phosphate and N-phosphonoacetyl-L-aspartate. An extensive protection by UMP was observed, which apparently included all trypsin-sensitive peptide bonds. No significant effect by the ligand pair succinate/carbamoyl phosphate was noted. It is concluded from these observations that UMP triggers an extensive, probably co-operative, transition to a proteinase-resistant conformation, and that carbamoyl phosphate similarly triggers a transition to an alternative, proteinase-sensitive, conformation. These antagonistic conformational changes may account for the regulatory kinetic effects reported elsewhere [Yon (1984) Biochem. J. 221, 281-287]. The protective effect by the ligand pairs aspartate/phosphate and succinate/carbamoyl phosphate, which operates only against trypsin, is concluded to be due to local shielding of essential lysine or arginine residues in the aspartate-binding pocket of the active site, to which aspartate (or its analogue, succinate) can only bind as part of a ternary complex.

Dataset Information

Wheat-germ aspartate transcarbamoylase. Purification and cold-lability.

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

Tweets