Tyrosine oxygenation

Galactose oxidase (GO) catalyses the two-electron oxidation of primary alcohols to aldehydes. It contains a single type II copper centre. The enzyme employs the metal and a protein radical cofactor to effect the chemistry. The crystal structure shows a square pyramidal five-coordinate copper site with the metal coordinated by two histidines, two tyrosines and a water or acetate ligand. The equatorial tyrosine, Tyr272, has an interesting crosslink to a cysteine group ortho to the tyrosine oxygen. 

The dopamine is then concentrated in storage vesicles via an ATP-dependent process. Here the rate-limiting step appears not to be precursor uptake, under normal conditions, but tyrosine hydroxylase activity. This is regulated by protein phosphorylation and by de novo enzyme synthesis. The enzyme requites oxygen, ferrous iron, and tetrahydrobiopterin (BH. The enzymatic conversion of the precursor to the active agent and its subsequent storage in a vesicle are energy-dependent processes. 

Figure 1.9 Examples of functionally important intrinsic metal atoms in proteins, (a) The di-iron center of the enzyme ribonucleotide reductase. Two iron atoms form a redox center that produces a free radical in a nearby tyrosine side chain. The iron atoms are bridged by a glutamic acid residue and a negatively charged oxygen atom called a p-oxo bridge. The coordination of the iron atoms is completed by histidine, aspartic acid, and glutamic acid side chains as well as water molecules, (b) The catalytically active zinc atom in the enzyme alcohol dehydrogenase. The zinc atom is coordinated to the protein by one histidine and two cysteine side chains. During catalysis zinc binds an alcohol molecule in a suitable position for hydride transfer to the coenzyme moiety, a nicotinamide, [(a) Adapted from P. Nordlund et al., Nature 345 593-598, 1990.)...

An isopropyl ether was developed as a phenol protective group that would be more stable to Lewis acids than would be an aryl benzyl ether. The isopropyl group has been tested for use in the protection of the phenolic oxygen of tyrosine during peptide synthesis."... 

In turn, 1O2 is a very electrophilic excited state species of molecular oxygen that interacts efficiently with electron-rich molecules, such as aminoadd residues of proteins like histidine, metionine, tryptophan, tyrosine, etc., by both physical and chemical quenching processes, eqns. 9 and 10 (Davies, 2003 Bisby et al., 1999). 

Criado, S. Escalada, J. P. Pajares, A. Garcia, N. A. (2008). Singlet molecular oxygen [02(lAg)]-mediated photodegradation of tyrosine derivatives in the presence of cationic and neutral micellar systems. Amino Acids, Vol. 35, No. 1, (June 2008), 201-208, ISSN 0939-4451... 

In hemoglobin M, histidine F8 (His F8) has been replaced by tyrosine. The iron of HbM forms a tight ionic complex with the phenolate anion of tyrosine that stabilizes the Fc3 form. In a-chain hemoglobin M variants, the R-T equilibrium favors the T state. Oxygen affinity is reduced, and the Bohr effect is absent. P Ghain hemoglobin M variants exhibit R-T switching, and the Bohr effect is therefore present. 

---