Subtilisin, specificity

Enzymatic acylation reactions offer considerable promise in the synthesis of specific ester derivatives of sucrose. For example, reaction of sucrose with an activated alkyl ester in /V, /V- dim ethyl form am i de in the presence of subtilisin gave 1 -0-butyrylsucrose, which on further treatment with an activated fatty acid ester in acetone in the presence of Hpase C. viscosum produced the 1, 6-diester derivative (71,72). 

Subtilisins are a group of serine proteinases that are produced by different species of bacilli. These enzymes are of considerable commercial interest because they are added to the detergents in washing powder to facilitate removal of proteinaceous stains. Numerous attempts have therefore recently been made to change by protein engineering such properties of the subtilisin molecule as its thermal stability, pH optimum, and specificity. In fact, in 1988 subtilisin mutants were the subject of the first US patent granted for an engineered protein. 

Figure 11.14 Schematic diagram of the active site of subtilisin. A region (residues 42-45) of a bound polypeptide inhibitor, eglin, is shown in red. The four essential features of the active site— the catalytic triad, the oxyanion hole, the specificity pocket, and the region for nonspecific binding of substrate—are highlighted in yellow. Important hydrogen bonds between enzyme and inhibitor are striped. This figure should be compared to Figure 11.9, which shows the same features for chymotrypsin. (Adapted from W. Bode et al., EMBO /.

The subtilisin mutants described here illustrate the power of protein engineering as a tool to allow us to identify the specific roles of side chains in the catalytic mechanisms of enzymes. In Chapter 17 we shall discuss the utility of protein engineering in other contexts, such as design of novel proteins and the elucidation of the energetics of ligand binding to proteins. 

Serine proteinases such as chymotrypsin and subtilisin catalyze the cleavage of peptide bonds. Four features essential for catalysis are present in the three-dimensional structures of all serine proteinases a catalytic triad, an oxyanion binding site, a substrate specificity pocket, and a nonspecific binding site for polypeptide substrates. These four features, in a very similar arrangement, are present in both chymotrypsin and subtilisin even though they are achieved in the two enzymes in completely different ways by quite different three-dimensional structures. Chymotrypsin is built up from two p-barrel domains, whereas the subtilisin structure is of the a/p type. These two enzymes provide an example of convergent evolution where completely different loop regions, attached to different framework structures, form similar active sites. 

Wells, J.A., et al. On the evolution of specificity and catalysis in subtilisin. Cold Spring Harbor Symp. Quant. Biol. 52 647-652, 1987. 

Subtilisin, 170 active site of, 171,173 autocorrelation function of, 216, 216 potential surfaces for, 218 site-specific mutations, 184, 185, 187-188 Sugars, see Oligosaccharides Surface-constrained solvent model, 125... 

Table 1.4 I nfluence ofthe organic solvent on the enantioselectivity ofthe protease subtilisin in the kinetic resolution ofthe racemic alcohol (10) (expressed as the enatiomeric ratio E, that is the ratio of the specificity constants of the two enatiomers, (lfcat/ M)s/...

Organic solvent can affect the enzyme specificity [76]. Authors have indicated that transesterification of l,4-butyloxy-2-octylbenzene and butanol in presence of lipases from Pseudomonas can produce two different products when using hydrophilic (acetonitrile) or hydrophobic (toluene) solvents. Zaks and Klibanov [16], demonstrated that subtilisine and a-chymotrypsine specificites can be changed as a function of solvent types. This is true for a limited number of biocatalysts. 

Serine proteases usually show primary specificity (occupation of subsite Si) for positively charged arginine or lysine (trypsin, plasmin, plasminogen activators, thrombin), large hydrophobic side chains of phenylalanine, tyrosine, and tryptophan (chymotrypsin, cathepsin G, chymase, and subtilisin), or small aliphatic side chains (elastases). Nevertheless, there are a large number of variations and in many cases, other subsites like S2 and S3 are more discriminating while maintaining the... 

Kawabata, T.T., Babcock, L.S., and Horn, P.A., Specific IgE and IgGl responses to subtilisin Carlsberg (Alcalase) in mice Development of an intratracheal exposure model, Fundam. Appl. Toxicol., 29, 238, 1996. 

A practical enzymatic procedure using alcalase as biocatalyst has been developed for the synthesis of hydrophilic peptides.Alcalase is an industrial alkaline protease from Bacillus licheniformis produced by Novozymes that has been used as a detergent and for silk degumming. The major enzyme component of alcalase is the serine protease subtilisin Carlsberg, which is one of the fully characterized bacterial proteases. Alcalase has better stability and activity in polar organic solvents, such as alcohols, acetonitrile, dimethylformamide, etc., than other proteases. In addition, alcalase has wide specificity and both l- and o-amino acids that are accepted as nucleophiles at the p-1 subsite. Therefore, alcalase is a suitable biocatalyst to catalyse peptide bond formation in organic solvents under kinetic control without any racemization of the amino acids (Scheme 5.1). 

Dehairing is carried out using alkaline proteases such as subtilisin in a very alkaline bath. Alkaline conditions tend to swell the hair roots, so easing the removal of the hair by allowing the proteases to selectively attack protein in the hair follicle. Other specific enzymes are used for skins from particular species. 

An entirely different property of subtilisin was affected by substituting leucine at the 222 location. Native BPN is extremely sensitive to the presence of oxidation agents, showing rapid inactivation when incubated in the presence of 0.3% H2O2 (Figure 4). The Leu-222 variant, in contrast, was found to be totally stable under the same oxidation conditions. The data clearly show that single amino acid alterations can have dramatic effects upon the activity of the enzyme. Similarly, other changes have been shown to affect catalytic properties, substrate specificities and thermostability (7,2,9). 

MW 27,500) with no cofactors or metal ions reqnirement for its function, it displays Michaelis-Menten kinetics and it is secreted in large amounts by a wide variety of Bacillus species. Subtilisin is also among the most important industrial enzymes due to its use in laundry detergents. Protein engineering strategies for subtilisin have focused on a number of aspects, namely catalysis, substrate specificity, thermal and oxidative stability and pH profile. We will describe briefly each of these aspects. 

Narhi et al. (1991) recently reported an enhancement in the thermal stability of aprA-subtilisin by three point mutations. The mutations were ASNi. SER and ASN. SER to prevent cyclisation with the adjacent glycines and ASN . ASP in the Ca binding loop. The mutant form also exhibits improved stability to detergent denaturation with little dependence on calcium concentration. Subtilisin 8350 (derived from subtilisin BPN via six site-specific mutations) was found to be 100 times more stable than the wild type enzyme in aqueous solution and 50 times more stable than the wild type in anhydrous dimethylformamide (Wong et al, 1990)... 

Carter, P., Nilsson, B., Bumier, J.P., Burdick, D. and Wells, J.A. (1989) Engineering subtilisin BPN for site-specific proteolysis. Proteins, 6, 240-248. 

Figure 1.6 Dependence of the substrate specificity of subtilisin Carlsberg on the calculated ratio of the solvent-to-water partition coefficients of N-Ac-Phe-OEt and N-Ac-Ser-OEt in various solvents. Reprinted with permission from [47]. Copyright (1993) American Chemical Society.

Considering these results and the contributions by Broos [125], Watanabe [126], and Ueji [55, 77], it may be concluded that the relation between enzyme flexibility and enanhoselective performance in organic solvents is now firmly established. Molecular dynamic simulations on the flexibility of subtilisin and the mobility of bound water molecules in carbon tetrachloride corroborate the idea that organic solvents reduce molecular flexibility via interactions at specific binding sites [127]. Whether predictive tools can be developed on the basis of this knowledge remains to be seen. 

When 18-crown-6 was co-lyophilized with a-chymotrypsin, a 470-fold activation was seen over the free enzyme in the transesterification of APEE with 1-propanol in cyclohexane (Scheme 3.2) [96]. There was a low apparent specificity for the size and macrocyclic nature of the crown ether additives, suggesting that, during lyophilization, 18-crown-6 protects the overall native conformation and acts as a lyoprotectant. To examine this global effect, FTIR was used to examine the effect of crown ethers on the secondary structure of enzymes. In one study [98], subtilisin Carlsberg was shown to retain its secondary structure in 1,4-dioxane when lyophi-lized in a 1 1 ratio with 18-crown-6. In addition, examination of FTIR spectra from varying incubation temperatures indicated that an increase in crown ether content in the final enzyme preparation resulted in a decreased denaturation temperature in the solvent, indicating a more flexible protein structure. 

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