Glutamic acid/glutamine mixtures

Such enzymes catalyse the condensation of specific compounds, accompanied by the breakdown of a pyrophosphate bond in adenosine triphosphate (10.64). Adenosine is the condensation product of a pentose (D-ribofuranose) and a purine (adenine). Scheme 10.15 shows the action of glutamine synthetase on a mixture of L-glutamic acid (10.65) and... 

The amino-acid composition usually is obtained by complete acid hydrolysis of the peptide into its component amino acids and analysis of the mixture by ion-exchange chromatography (Section 25-4C). This procedure is complicated by the fact that tryptophan is destroyed under acidic conditions. Also, asparagine and glutamine are converted to aspartic and glutamic acids, respectively. 

The amide bonds in peptides and proteins can be hydrolyzed in strong acid or base Treatment of a peptide or protein under either of these conditions yields a mixture of the constituent amino acids. Neither acid- nor base-catalyzed hydrolysis of a protein leads to ideal results because both tend to destroy some constituent ammo acids. Acid-catalyzed hydrolysis destroys tryptophan and cysteine, causes some loss of serine and threonine, and converts asparagine and glutamine to aspartic acid and glutamic acid, respectively. Base-catalyzed hydrolysis leads to destruction of serine, threonine, cysteine, and cystine and also results in racemization of the free amino acids. Because acid-catalyzed hydrolysis is less destructive, it is often the method of choice. The hydrolysis procedure consists of dissolving the protein sample in aqueous acid, usually 6 M HC1, and heating the solution in a sealed, evacuated vial at 100°C for 12 to 24 hours. 

At pH 7.5 less than 1% of the compound exists in the open-chain a-keto-acid form while at pH 9 approximately 3% is in a form that reacts as a typical a-keto acid. Glutamine transaminase also catalyzes the transamination of glutamic acid y-A -methylamide the expected transamination product, a-keto-A-methylglutaramic acid has not yet been isolated from a transamination reaction mixture. However, this compound was... 

Figure 6.8 Experimental variation of the retention of 23 phenylthiohydantoin (PTH) derivatives of amino acids with mobile phase composition in RPLC. Mobile phase mixtures of acetonitrile and 0.05M aqueous sodium nitrate buffer (pH — 5.81). All mobile phases contain 3% THF. Stationary phase ODS silica. Solutes D = aspartic acid C-OH = cysteic acid E = glutamic acid N = asparagine S = serine T = threonine G = glycine H = histidine Q = glutamine R = arginine A = alanine METS = methionine sulphone ABA = a-aminobutyric acid Y = tyrosine P = proline V = valine M = methionine NV = norvaline I = isoleucine F = phenylalanine L = leucine W = tryptophan K = lysine. Figure taken from ref. [610]. Reprinted with permission.

Fig. 2. The elution pattern of a standard mixture of OPA-derivatized primary amines, separated on a 5 (Jim Nucleosil C-18 column (200 X 4.6 mm id). The flow-rate was 1 mL/min employing the indicated gradient of metlianol and Na phosphate buffer (50 mA4, pH 5.25). Each peak represents 39 pmol except for those indicated below. 1, glutathione 2, cysteic acid 3, O-phosphoserine (19.5 pmol) 4, cysteine sulfinic acid 5, aspartic acid 6, asparagine (19.5 pmol) 7, glutamic acid 8, histidine 9, serine 10, glutamine 11, 3-methyl-histidine 12, a-aminoadipic acid (9.8 pmol) 13, citrulline (9.8 pmol) 14, carnosine 15, threonine,glycine 16, O-phosphoethanolamine 17, taurine (19.5 pmol) 18, p-alanine (19.5 pmol) 19, tyrosine 20, alanine 21, a-aminoisobutyric acid 22, aminoisobutyric acid 23, y-amino-ii-butyric acid 24, p-amino-u-butyric acid 25, a-amino-butyric acid 26, histamine 27, cystathione (19.5 pmol) 28, methionine 29, valine 30, phenylalanine 31, isoleucine 32, leucine 33, 5-hydroxytryptamine (5-H i ) 34, lysine. The chromatographic system consisted of a Varian LC 5000 chromatograph and a Schoeffel FS 970 fluorimeter.

Predict the direction of migration in an electrophoresis apparatus of each component in a mixture of glutamine, histidine, and glutamic acid at pH 6. 

Figure 9.44 Chromatogram of assay of asparagine synthetase. Peaks 1, o-phthaldialdehyde aspartate 2, glutamate 3, asparagine 4, glutamine. A mixture of 0.025 mAf of each amino acid was made and 20 yu.L injected. (From Unnithan et al., 1984.)...

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