Probing the Unusual Oxidation/Reduction Behavior of Paracoccus pantotrophus Cytochrome cd1 Nitrite Reductase by Replacing a Switchable Methionine Heme Iron Ligand with Histidine

Role of distal arginine residue in the mechanism of heme nitrite reductases

Heme nitrite reductases reduce NO₂^- by 1e^-/2H⁺ to NO or by 6e^-/8H⁺ to NH₄⁺ which are key steps in the global nitrogen cycle. Second-sphere residues, such as arginine (with a guanidine head group), are proposed to play a key role in the reaction by assisting substrate binding and hydrogen bonding and by providing protons to the active site for the reaction. The reactivity of an iron porphyrin with a NO₂^- covalently attached to a guanidinium arm in its 2nd sphere was investigated to understand the role of arginine residues in the 2nd sphere of heme nitrite reductases. The presence of the guanidinium residue allows the synthetic ferrous porphyrin to reduce NO₂^- and produce a ferrous nitrosyl species ({FeNO}⁷), where the required protons are provided by the guanidinium group in the 2nd sphere. However, in the presence of additional proton sources in solution, the reaction of ferrous porphyrin with NO₂^- results in the formation of ferric porphyrin and the release of NO. Spectroscopic and kinetic data indicated that re-protonation of the guanidine group in the 2nd sphere by an external proton source causes NO to dissociate from a ferric nitrosyl species ({FeNO}⁶) at rates similar to those observed for enzymatic sites. This re-protonation of the guanidine group mimics the proton recharge mechanism in the active site of NiR. DFT calculations indicated that the lability of the Fe-NO bond in the {FeNO}⁶ species is derived from the greater binding affinity of anions (e.g. NO₂^-) to the ferric center relative to neutral NO due to hydrogen bonding and electrostatic interaction of these bound anions with the protonated guanidium group in the 2nd sphere. The reduced {FeNO}⁷ species, once formed, is not affected significantly by the re-protonation of the guanidine residue. These results provide direct insight into the role of the 2nd sphere arginine residue present in the active sites of heme-based NiRs in determining the fate of NO₂^- reduction. Specifically, the findings using the synthetic model suggest that rapid re-protonation of these arginine residues may trigger the dissociation of NO from the {FeNO}⁶, which may also be the case in the protein active site.

The Biologically Relevant Coordination Chemistry of Iron and Nitric Oxide: Electronic Structure and Reactivity

Nitric oxide (NO) is an important signaling molecule that is involved in a wide range of physiological and pathological events in biology. Metal coordination chemistry, especially with iron, is at the heart of many biological transformations involving NO. A series of heme proteins, nitric oxide synthases (NOS), soluble guanylate cyclase (sGC), and nitrophorins, are responsible for the biosynthesis, sensing, and transport of NO. Alternatively, NO can be generated from nitrite by heme- and copper-containing nitrite reductases (NIRs). The NO-bearing small molecules such as nitrosothiols and dinitrosyl iron complexes (DNICs) can serve as an alternative vehicle for NO storage and transport. Once NO is formed, the rich reaction chemistry of NO leads to a wide variety of biological activities including reduction of NO by heme or non-heme iron-containing NO reductases and protein post-translational modifications by DNICs. Much of our understanding of the reactivity of metal sites in biology with NO and the mechanisms of these transformations has come from the elucidation of the geometric and electronic structures and chemical reactivity of synthetic model systems, in synergy with biochemical and biophysical studies on the relevant proteins themselves. This review focuses on recent advancements from studies on proteins and model complexes that not only have improved our understanding of the biological roles of NO but also have provided foundations for biomedical research and for bio-inspired catalyst design in energy science.

Biochemical and artificial pathways for the reduction of carbon dioxide, nitrite and the competing proton reduction: effect of 2nd sphere interactions in catalysis

Reduction of oxides and oxoanions of carbon and nitrogen are of great contemporary importance as they are crucial for a sustainable environment.

Recent advances in the biosynthesis of modified tetrapyrroles: the discovery of an alternative pathway for the formation of heme and heme d 1

Hemes (a, b, c, and o) and heme d 1 belong to the group of modified tetrapyrroles, which also includes chlorophylls, cobalamins, coenzyme F430, and siroheme. These compounds are found throughout all domains of life and are involved in a variety of essential biological processes ranging from photosynthesis to methanogenesis. The biosynthesis of heme b has been well studied in many organisms, but in sulfate-reducing bacteria and archaea, the pathway has remained a mystery, as many of the enzymes involved in these characterized steps are absent. The heme pathway in most organisms proceeds from the cyclic precursor of all modified tetrapyrroles uroporphyrinogen III, to coproporphyrinogen III, which is followed by oxidation of the ring and finally iron insertion. Sulfate-reducing bacteria and some archaea lack the genetic information necessary to convert uroporphyrinogen III to heme along the "classical" route and instead use an "alternative" pathway. Biosynthesis of the isobacteriochlorin heme d 1, a cofactor of the dissimilatory nitrite reductase cytochrome cd 1, has also been a subject of much research, although the biosynthetic pathway and its intermediates have evaded discovery for quite some time. This review focuses on the recent advances in the understanding of these two pathways and their surprisingly close relationship via the unlikely intermediate siroheme, which is also a cofactor of sulfite and nitrite reductases in many organisms. The evolutionary questions raised by this discovery will also be discussed along with the potential regulation required by organisms with overlapping tetrapyrrole biosynthesis pathways.

Cytochrome cd1 nitrite reductase NirS is involved in anaerobic magnetite biomineralization in Magnetospirillum gryphiswaldense and requires NirN for proper d1 heme assembly

The alphaproteobacterium Magnetospirillum gryphiswaldense synthesizes magnetosomes, which are membrane-enveloped crystals of magnetite. Here we show that nitrite reduction is involved in redox control during anaerobic biomineralization of the mixed-valence iron oxide magnetite. The cytochrome cd1-type nitrite reductase NirS shares conspicuous sequence similarity with NirN, which is also encoded within a larger nir cluster. Deletion of any one of these two nir genes resulted in impaired growth and smaller, fewer, and aberrantly shaped magnetite crystals during nitrate reduction. However, whereas nitrite reduction was completely abolished in the ΔnirS mutant, attenuated but significant nitrite reduction occurred in the ΔnirN mutant, indicating that only NirS is a nitrite reductase in M. gryphiswaldense. However, the ΔnirN mutant produced a different form of periplasmic d(1) heme that was not noncovalently bound to NirS, indicating that NirN is required for full reductase activity by maintaining a proper form of d1 heme for holo-cytochrome cd(1) assembly. In conclusion, we assign for the first time a physiological function to NirN and demonstrate that effective nitrite reduction is required for biomineralization of wild-type crystals, probably by contributing to oxidation of ferrous iron under oxygen-limited conditions.

Observation of fast release of NO from ferrous d₁ haem allows formulation of a unified reaction mechanism for cytochrome cd₁ nitrite reductases

Cytochrome cd1 nitrite reductase is a haem-containing enzyme responsible for the reduction of nitrite into NO, a key step in the anaerobic respiratory process of denitrification. The active site of cytochrome cd1 contains the unique d1 haem cofactor, from which NO must be released. In general, reduced haems bind NO tightly relative to oxidized haems. In the present paper, we present experimental evidence that the reduced d1 haem of cytochrome cd1 from Paracoccus pantotrophus releases NO rapidly (k=65-200 s(-1)); this result suggests that NO release is the rate-limiting step of the catalytic cycle (turnover number=72 s(-1)). We also demonstrate, using a complex of the d1 haem and apomyoglobin, that the rapid dissociation of NO is largely controlled by the d1 haem cofactor itself. We present a reaction mechanism proposed to be applicable to all cytochromes cd1 and conclude that the d1 haem has evolved to have low affinity for NO, as compared with other ferrous haems.

d(1) haem biogenesis - assessing the roles of three nir gene products

The synthesis of the modified tetrapyrrole known as d(1) haem requires several dedicated proteins which are coded for by a set of genes that are often found adjacent to the structural gene, nirS, for cytochrome cd(1) nitrite reductase. NirE, the product of the first gene in the nir biogenesis operon, was anticipated to catalyse the conversion of uroporphyrinogen III into precorrin-2; this was confirmed, but it was shown that this enzyme is less sensitive to product inhibition than similar enzymes that function in other biosynthetic pathways. Sequence analysis suggesting that one of these proteins, NirN, is a c-type cytochrome, and has similarity to the part of cytochrome cd(1) that binds d(1), was validated by recombinant production and characterization of NirN. A NirN-d(1) haem complex was demonstrated to release the cofactor to a semi-apo form of cytochrome cd(1) from which d(1) was extracted, suggesting a role for NirN in the assembly of cytochrome cd(1) (NirS). However, inactivation of nirN surprisingly led to only a marginal attenuation of growth of Paracoccus pantotrophus under anaerobic denitrifying conditions. As predicted, NirC is a c-type cytochrome; it was shown in vitro to be an electron donor to the NirN-d(1) complex.

Activation of the cytochrome cd1 nitrite reductase from Paracoccus pantotrophus. Reaction of oxidized enzyme with substrate drives a ligand switch at heme c

Cytochromes cd(1) are dimeric bacterial nitrite reductases, which contain two hemes per monomer. On reduction of both hemes, the distal ligand of heme d(1) dissociates, creating a vacant coordination site accessible to substrate. Heme c, which transfers electrons from donor proteins into the active site, has histidine/methionine ligands except in the oxidized enzyme from Paracoccus pantotrophus where both ligands are histidine. During reduction of this enzyme, Tyr(25) dissociates from the distal side of heme d(1), and one heme c ligand is replaced by methionine. Activity is associated with histidine/methionine coordination at heme c, and it is believed that P. pantotrophus cytochrome cd(1) is unreactive toward substrate without reductive activation. However, we report here that the oxidized enzyme will react with nitrite to yield a novel species in which heme d(1) is EPR-silent. Magnetic circular dichroism studies indicate that heme d(1) is low-spin Fe(III) but EPR-silent as a result of spin coupling to a radical species formed during the reaction with nitrite. This reaction drives the switch to histidine/methionine ligation at Fe(III) heme c. Thus the enzyme is activated by exposure to its physiological substrate without the necessity of passing through the reduced state. This reactivity toward nitrite is also observed for oxidized cytochrome cd(1) from Pseudomonas stutzeri suggesting a more general involvement of the EPR-silent Fe(III) heme d(1) species in nitrite reduction.

Fast Dissociation of Nitric Oxide from Ferrous Pseudomonas aeruginosa cd1 Nitrite Reductase

The heme-containing periplasmic nitrite reductase (cd(1) NIR) is responsible for the production of nitric oxide (NO) in denitrifying bacterial species, among which are several animal and plant pathogens. Heme NIRs are homodimers, each subunit containing one covalently bound c-heme and one d(1)-heme. The reduction of nitrite to NO involves binding of nitrite to the reduced protein at the level of d(1)-heme, followed by dehydration of nitrite to yield NO and release of the latter. The crucial rate-limiting step in the catalytic mechanism is thought to be the release of NO from the d(1)-heme, which has been proposed, but never demonstrated experimentally, to occur when the iron is in the ferric form, given that the reduced NO-bound derivative was presumed to be very stable, as in other hemeproteins. We have measured for the first time the kinetics of NO binding and release from fully reduced cd(1) NIR, using the enzyme from Pseudomonas aeruginosa and its site-directed mutant H369A. Quite unexpectedly, we found that NO dissociation from the reduced d(1)-heme is very rapid, several orders of magnitude faster than that measured for b-type heme containing reduced hemeproteins. Because the rate of NO dissociation from reduced cd(1) NIR, measured in the present report, is faster than or comparable with the turnover number, contrary to expectations this event may well be on the catalytic cycle and not necessarily rate-limiting. This finding also provides a rationale for the presence in cd(1) NIR of the peculiar d(1)-heme cofactor, which has probably evolved to ensure fast product dissociation.