Carbonic anhydrases active site features

Carboxypeptidase A was the first metalloenzyme where the functional requirement of zinc was clearly demonstrated (9, 92). In similarity to carbonic anhydrase, the chelating site can combine with a variety of metal ions (93), but the activation specificity is broader. Some metal ions, Pb2+, Cd2+ and Hg2+, yield only esterase activity but fail to restore the peptidase activity. Of a variety of cations tested, only Cu2+ gives a completely inactive enzyme. In the standard peptidase assay, cobalt carboxypeptidase is the most active metal derivative, while it has about the same esterase activity as the native enzyme ((93, 94), Table 6). Kinetically, the Co(II) enzyme shows the same qualitative features as the native enzyme (95), and the quantitative differences are not restricted to a single kinetic parameter. 

The circular dichroic spectrum of cobalt alkaline phosphatase (Fig. 16) shows more clearly the complexity of the visible absorption. Although it can not be ruled out that the spectrum of this Co (I I) enzyme represents two slightly different Co(II) sites, there are striking similarities with Co(II) carbonic anhydrase, which has only one metal-binding site. At high pH, cobalt carbonic anhydrase and cobalt alkaline phosphatase have several spectral features in common, and both may have a similar kind of irregular coordination. It should be noted, however, that the absorption coefficient for Co(II) alkaline phosphatase per equivalent of activity-linked metal ion is only half of the value for Co(II) carbonic anhydrase. 

The kinetics and electronic mechanisms of conventional chemical catalysts- are contrasted with those in enzymes. The analogy between certain attributes of surfactants and phase-transfer catalysis and enzyme active sites are made and the limitations of surface catalysts and zeolites are pointed out. The principle features that give enz3nnes their unusual rate enhancements and remarkable specificity are discussed and ways in which these can be realized in man-made catalysts are proposed. The catalytic activation of CO2 by both enzymatic and non-enzymatic means, including a detailed analysis of the electronic reaction sequence for the metalloenzyme carbonic anhydrase, is used to illustrate the above themes. 

Again by analogy with peptide hydrolysis, metalloenzymes catalyzing ester hydrolysis may take advantage of additional chemical features provided by amino-acid residues present in the active-site cavity. This situation occurs with car-boxypeptidase, " which shows esterase activity in vitro. Although the rate-limiting steps for carboxylic esters and peptides may differ, several features, such as the pH dependences of cat and and the presence of two spectroscopically observable intermediates, point to substantially similar mechanisms. On the other hand, carboxylic ester hydrolysis catalyzed by carbonic anhydrase seems to rely on fewer additional features of the active-site cavity, perhaps only on the presence of a metal-coordinated hydroxide that can perform the nucleophilic attack on the carbonyl carbon atom." ... 

Over the last two decades, a thousand structural and functional models for carbonic anhydrase were reported to address the features of the active site and the mechanism of the catalytic reaction. One of the earliest functional models is the supramolecular composite of the Z /5(histamino)cyclodextrin-Zn-imidazole complex 3 that accelerates CO2 hydration at pH 7.0. although the catalytic activity is not good compared with the native... 

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