Identification of a glutamate residue at the active site of xylanase A from Schizophyllum commune

Residue mutations of xylanase in Aspergillus kawachii alter its optimum pH

Aspergillus kawachii and Aspergillus niger have been traditionally used as molds for commercial microbial fermentation because of their capability to grow in extremely acidic environments and produce acid-stable enzymes. Endo-1,4-β-xylanase cleaves the glycosidic bonds in the xylan backbone, consequently reducing the degree of polymerization of the substrate. The amino acid sequences of xylanases from A. kawachii and A. niger only differ in one amino acid residue. However, the xylanases from A. kawachii and A. niger show different optimum pH values of 2.0 and 3.0, respectively. In this study, we synthesized the A. kawachii xylanase gene (XynC) on the basis of the bias codon of yeast and mutated the gene in the dominating region related to optimum pH shifting during gene synthesis. After the overexpression of this gene in Pichia pastoris G115, the mutant (Thr64Ser) enzyme (XynC-C) showed an optimum pH of 3.8, which indicated partial alkalinity compared with the original xylanase from A. kawachii. Similar to that of the enzyme with one residue mutation (Asp48Asn), the optimum pH of the enzyme with two residue mutations (Thr64Ser and Asp48Asn) shifted to 5.0. The result indicated that mutation Asp48 was more important than mutation Thr64 in optimum pH shifting. We proposed a model that explains the lower optimum pH of XynC-C than other members of the xylanase family G. XynC-C showed similar proteolytic resistance and Km and Vmax values for beechwood xylan to other xylanases.

Identification of active site residues of Fenugreek β-amylase: chemical modification and in silico approach

The amino acid sequence of Fenugreek β-amylase is not available in protein data bank. Therefore, an attempt has been made to identify the catalytic amino acid residues of enzyme by employing studies of pH dependence of enzyme catalysis, chemical modification and bioinformatics. Treatment of purified Fenugreek β-amylase with EDAC in presence of glycine methyl ester and sulfhydryl group specific reagents (IAA, NEM and p-CMB), followed a pseudo first-order kinetics and resulted in effective inactivation of enzyme. The reaction with EDAC in presence of NTEE (3-nitro-l-tyrosine ethylester) resulted into modification of two carboxyl groups per molecule of enzyme and presence of one accessible sulfhydryl group at the active site, per molecule of enzyme was ascertained by titration with DTNB. The above results were supported by the prevention of inactivation of enzyme in presence of substrate. Based on MALDI-TOF analysis of purified Fenugreek β-amylase and MASCOT search, β-amylase of Medicago sativa was found to be the best match. To further confirm the amino acid involved in catalysis, homology modelling of β-amylase of M. sativa was performed. The sequence alignment, superimposition of template and target models, along with study of interactions involved in docking of sucrose and maltose at the active site, led to identification of Glu187, Glu381 and Cys344 as active site residues.

ZDOCK and RDOCK performance in CAPRI rounds 3, 4, and 5

We present an evaluation of the results of our ZDOCK and RDOCK algorithms in Rounds 3, 4, and 5 of the protein docking challenge CAPRI. ZDOCK is a Fast Fourier Transform (FFT)-based, initial-stage rigid-body docking algorithm, and RDOCK is an energy minimization algorithm for refining and reranking ZDOCK results. Of the 9 targets for which we submitted predictions, we attained at least acceptable accuracy for 7, at least medium accuracy for 6, and high accuracy for 3. These results are evidence that ZDOCK in combination with RDOCK is capable of making accurate predictions on a diverse set of protein complexes.

Characterization of function and activity of domains A, B and C of xylanase C from Fibrobacter succinogenes S85

Xylanase C from the ruminant bacterium Fibrobacter succinogenes is comprised of two catalytic domains, A and B, and a third domain, C, of unknown function. The DNA coding for domains A and B of xylanase C were separately cloned and expressed in Escherichia coli as fusion proteins with glutathione-S:-transferase. The fusion proteins were isolated by affinity chromatography on glutathione-Sepharose 4B, cleaved with thrombin and the released xylanase C catalytic domains A and B were purified to apparent homogeneity by anion-exchange chromatography on Mono Q. Electrospray mass spectrometry provided a molecular mass of 27 818 Da (expected, 27 820 Da) for domain B. The pH and temperature optima for activity of domain B on oat spelt xylan were 5.0 and 52 degrees C, respectively. A kinetic analysis of the activity of the catalytic domain A on oat spelt xylan, birch wood xylan and xylooligomers at pH 6.5 and 37 degrees C provided data significantly different to those obtained previously with a protease-derived form of the enzyme [Zhu et al. (1994) J. Bacteriol. 176, 3885-3894]. The isolated domain A was more active on barley-glucan than the protease-derived form and its affinity for birch wood xylan was enhanced resulting in greater overall catalytic efficiency as reflected by k(cat)/K:(M) values. Likewise, significant differences in the Michaelis-Menten parameters K:(M), k(cat) and k(cat)/K:(M) were obtained with domain B compared with values previously reported with this domain attached to domain C. In general, the presence of domain C appeared to decrease the overall efficiency of domain B 7- and 36-fold with birch wood xylan and xylopentaose as substrates, respectively, as reflected by values of k(cat)/K:(M). The removal of domain C also affected the mode of action of domain B such that it more closely resembled that of catalytic domain A. However, no change in either pH and temperature optima or stability were found with domain B compared with the combined domains B and C. The function of domain C remains unknown, but hydrophobic cluster analysis indicated that it may belong to a class of dockerin domains involved in the protein-protein interactions of cellulolytic and xylanolytic complexes.

Catalytic thiol and carboxylate: role of cysteine and glutamic acid in the xylosidic activity of endoxylanase from Chainia sp. (NCL 82-5-1)

Chemical modification of the endoxylanase from Chainia sp. with group-specific chemical modifiers in the absence and presence of substrate and kinetics of modification revealed the involvement of a thiol and a carboxylate in the catalytic function of the enzyme. The active-site peptides were chemically labeled and sequenced. The sequence alignment of the chemically labeled peptide with other family G/11 xylanases showed that the catalytic glutamate of Chainia xylanase is located in a highly homologous region and may function as an acid/base catalyst while thiol of the Cys may function as a nucleophile.

Identification of the catalytic nucleophile in the cellulase from Schizophyllum commune and assignment of the enzyme to Family 5, subtype 5 of the glycosidases

Differential chemical modification of the cellulase from Schizophyllum commune with [N-methyl-3H]1-ethyl-3(4-azonia-4,4-dimethylpentyl)-carbodiimide in the presence and absence of substrate identified an active site glutamate residue within the peptide: Leu-Gln-Ala-Ala-Thr-Glu-Trp-Leu-(Lys). This Glu residue is proposed to participate in binding of substrate as amino acid sequence homology studies combined with mechanism-based inhibition of the cellulase with 4',5'-epoxypentyl-beta-D-cellobioside identified a neighboring Glu residue, which conforms to the Glu-X-Gly motif of Family 5 glycosidases, as the catalytic nucleophile. These data allow the assignment of the S. commune cellulase to Family 5, subtype 5 of the glycosidases.

Cloning, sequencing and expression of the cDNA of endoxylanase B from Penicillium purpurogenum

The cDNA for xylanase B from Penicillium purpurogenum was cloned and sequenced. This DNA encodes a protein of 208 amino acids which is expected to yield a protein of 183 residues upon processing of the N terminus. The sequence of the predicted protein is very similar to that of 40 other xylanase domains which belong to family G of cellulases/xylanases (73-21% identity).

Probing the role of tryptophan residues in a cellulose-binding domain by chemical modification

The cellulose-binding domain (CBDCex) of the mixed function glucanase-xylanase Cex from Cellulomonas fimi contains five tryptophans, two of which are located within the beta-barrel structure and three exposed on the surface (Xu GY et al., 1995, Biochemistry 34:6993-7009). Although all five tryptophans can be oxidized by N-bromosuccinimide (NBS), stopped-flow measurements show that three tryptophans react faster than the other two. NMR analysis during the titration of CBDCex with NBS shows that the tryptophans on the surface of the protein are fully oxidized before there is significant reaction with the two buried tryptophans. Additionally, modification of the exposed tryptophans does not affect the conformation of the backbone of CBDCex, whereas complete oxidation of all five tryptophans denatures the polypeptide. The modification of the equivalent of one and two tryptophans by NBS reduces binding of CBDCex to cellulose by 70% and 90%, respectively. This confirms the direct role of the exposed aromatic residues in the binding of CBDCex to cellulose. Although adsorption to cellulose does afford some protection against NBS, as evidenced by the increased quantity of NBS required to oxidize all of the tryptophan residues, the polypeptide can still be oxidized completely when adsorbed. This suggests that, whereas the binding appears to be irreversible overall [Ong E et al., 1989, Bio/Technology 7:604-607], each of the exposed tryptophans interacts reversibly with cellulose.

Comparison of the properties of native and pentaammineruthenium(III)-modified xylanase

Two xylanases, xynA of Bacillus pumilus and xyn II of Trichoderma reesei, were purified and then modified by the attachment of pentaammineruthenium, thereby resulting in the generation of a xylanase with veratryl alcohol oxidase activity. Hydrolytic activity of T. reesei xyn II on soluble xylans was unchanged by modification with pentaammineruthenium; however, modification of B. pumilus xynA greatly reduced xylan hydrolysis unless the active site of the xylanase was protected with xylose during the modification. The presence of histidine, cysteine, or reduced glutathione during xylan hydrolysis greatly increased the xylanase activity of the pentaammineruthenium-modified B. pumilus xylanase. Glycine, glutamic acid, methionine, or oxidized glutathione had no effect on xylanase activity.

Evidence for lysozyme-type mechanism of hydrolysis in xylanases

In the last year several new xylanase three-dimensional structures were solved. Examination of these new structures in combination with recently obtained data from site-directed mutagenesis and kinetic analysis provided insights into the catalytic mechanism of xylanases. It is now possible to determine the type of mechanism by which xylanases hydrolyse a complex substrate such as xylan.

Hyaluronidases--a group of neglected enzymes

Hyaluronan is an important constituent of the extracellular matrix. This polysaccharide can be hydrolyzed by various hyaluronidases that are widely distributed in nature. The structure of some bacterial and animal enzymes of this type has recently been elucidated. It could be shown that the hyaluronidases from bee and hornet venom and the PH-20 hyaluronidase present on mammalian spermatozoa are homologous proteins.

Approaches to labeling and identification of active site residues in glycosidases

Glycosidases play a key role in a number of biological processes and, as such, are of considerable clinical and biotechnological importance. Knowledge of the identifies of catalytically important active site residues is essential for understanding the catalytic mechanism, for enzyme classification, and for targeted bioengineering of glycosidases with altered characteristics. Here we review and discuss traditional strategies and novel approaches based on tandem mass spectrometry for the identification of the key active site residues in glycosidases.

Mechanisms of enzymatic glycoside hydrolysis

The determination of a large number of three-dimensional structures of glycosidases, both free and in complex with ligands, has provided valuable new insights into glycosidase catalysis, especially when coupled with results from studies of specifically labelled glycosidases and kinetic analyses of point mutants.