Quinones ubiquinone

The name ubiquinone is a shortened form of ubiquitous quinone a term coined to describe the observation that this substance can be found m all cells The length of its side chain varies among different organisms the most common form m vertebrates has n = 10 and ubiquinones m which n = 6 to 9 are found m yeasts and plants... 

The decline in immune function may pardy depend on a deficiency of coenzyme Q, a group of closely related quinone compounds (ubiquinones) that participate in the mitochondrial electron transport chain (49). Concentrations of coenzyme Q (specifically coenzyme Q q) appear to decline with age in several organs, most notably the thymus. 

The ready reversibility of this reaction is essential to the role that quinones play in cellular respiration, the process by which an organism uses molecular- oxygen to convert its food to carbon dioxide, water, and energy. Electrons are not transfened directly from the substrate molecule to oxygen but instead are transfened by way of an electron transport chain involving a succession of oxidation-reduction reactions. A key component of this electron transport chain is the substance known as ubiquinone, or coenzyme Q ... 

Coenzyme Q (Section 24.14) Naturally occurring group of related quinones involved in the chemistry of cellular respiration. Also known as ubiquinone. 

The redox properties of quinones are crucial to the functioning of living cells, where compounds called ubiquinones act as biochemical oxidizing agents to mediate the electron-transfer processes involved in energy production. Ubiquinones, also called coenzymes Q, are components of the cells of all aerobic organisms, from the simplest bacterium to humans. They are so named because of their ubiquitous occurrence in nature. 

All these latter centers were seen to titrate at around 150 mV, that is, some 150 mV lower than the traditional centers, and thus form a separate subclass of this type of redox proteins (see Fig. 7). Since similar downshifts were observed for almost all redox components in the mentioned species (for a compilation, see 133), it is generally assumed that the differences between the two groups represent an adaptation to the difference in value of the quinone pool, which is plastoquinone(PQ)/ubiquinone(UQ) E 100 mV) in the traditional species and menaquinone (MK) Em,i---70 mV) in the other... 

Ubiquinone or Q (coenjyme Q) (Figure 12-5) finks the flavoproteins to cytochrome h, the member of the cytochrome chain of lowest redox potential. Q exists in the oxidized quinone or reduced quinol form under aerobic or anaerobic conditions, respectively. The structure of Q is very similar to that of vitamin K and vitamin E (Chapter 45) and of plastoquinone, found in chloroplasts. Q acts as a mobile component of the respiratory chain that collects reducing equivalents from the more fixed flavoprotein complexes and passes them on to the cytochromes. 

The shikimate pathway is the major route in the biosynthesis of ubiquinone, menaquinone, phyloquinone, plastoquinone, and various colored naphthoquinones. The early steps of this process are common with the steps involved in the biosynthesis of phenols, flavonoids, and aromatic amino acids. Shikimic acid is formed in several steps from precursors of carbohydrate metabolism. The key intermediate in quinone biosynthesis via the shikimate pathway is the chorismate. In the case of ubiquinones, the chorismate is converted to para-hydoxybenzoate and then, depending on the organism, the process continues with prenylation, decarboxylation, three hydroxy-lations, and three methylation steps. - ... 

The third pathway involved in the quinones biosynthesis is the isoprenoid route. This pathway is primarily important for the formation of prenyl side chains of prenylquinones (ubiquinone, menaquinone, plastoquinones, etc.). The side chains of ubiquinones and prenylated naphthoquinones derive from polyprenyl diphosphates. 

Reaction centers of bacteria contain polypeptides, bacteriochlorophylls, bacteriopheo-phytins, two quinines, and nonheme iron atom. In some bacterial species, both the quinones are ubiquinones, whereas in some others one of the quinones is menaquinone [37,39]. Depending on the bacterial species chloroplasts contain plastoquinone and phyl-loquinone. Structures of ubiquinone, menaquinone, and phylloquinone are provided in Figures 7.12 through 7.14, respectively. 

Schnurr et al. [22] showed that rabbit 15-LOX oxidized beef heart submitochondrial particles to form phospholipid-bound hydroperoxy- and keto-polyenoic fatty acids and induced the oxidative modification of membrane proteins. It was also found that the total oxygen uptake significantly exceeded the formation of oxygenated polyenoic acids supposedly due to the formation of hydroxyl radicals by the reaction of ubiquinone with lipid 15-LOX-derived hydroperoxides. However, it is impossible to agree with this proposal because it is known for a long time [23] that quinones cannot catalyze the formation of hydroxyl radicals by the Fenton reaction. Oxidation of intracellular unsaturated acids (for example, linoleic and arachidonic acids) by lipoxygenases can be suppressed by fatty acid binding proteins [24]. 

There are two kinds of redox interactions, in which ubiquinones can manifest their antioxidant activity the reactions with quinone and hydroquinone forms. It is assumed that the ubiquinone-ubisemiquinone pair (Figure 29.10) is an electron carrier in mitochondrial respiratory chain. There are numerous studies [235] suggesting that superoxide is formed during the one-electron oxidation of ubisemiquinones (Reaction (25)). As this reaction is a reversible one, its direction depends on one-electron reduction potentials of semiquinone and dioxygen. 

In the case of ubiquinones we have already considered the ability of quinones to react with superoxide and other free radicals. Naphthoquinones, vitamin K and its derivatives, especially menadione, are the well known producers of superoxide through redox cycling with dioxygen. However, in 1985, Canfield et al. [254] have shown that vitamin K quinone reduced the oxidation of linoleic acid while vitamin K hydroquinone stimulated lipid peroxidation. Surprisingly, later on, conflicting results were reported by Vervoort et al. [255] who found that only hydroquinones of vitamin K and its analogs inhibited microsomal lipid peroxidation. 

Over the years, there have been numerous reports of oxidase preparations that contain polypeptide components, additional to those described above. As yet no molecular probes are available for these, and so their true association with the oxidase is unconfirmed. There are many reports in the literature describing the role of ubiquinone as an electron transfer component of the oxidase, but its involvement is controversial. Quinones (ubiquinone-10) have reportedly been detected in some neutrophil membrane preparations, but other reports have shown that neither plasma membranes, specific granules nor most oxidase preparations contain appreciable amounts of quinone, although some is found in either tertiary granules or mitochondria. Still other reports suggest that ubiquinone, flavoprotein and cytochrome b are present in active oxidase preparations. Thus, the role of ubiquinone and other quinones in oxidase activity is in doubt, but the available evidence weighs against their involvement. Indeed, the refinement of the cell-free activation system described above obviates the requirement for any other redox carriers for oxidase function. 

The first of these new, electron transferring components was coenzyme Q (CoQ). Festenstein in R.A. Morton s laboratory in Liverpool had isolated crude preparations from intestinal mucosa in 1955. Purer material was obtained the next year from rat liver by Morton. The material was lipid soluble, widely distributed, and had the properties of a quinone and so was initially called ubiquinone. Its function was unclear. At the same time Crane, Hatefi and Lester in Wisconsin were trying to identify the substances in the electron transport chain acting between NADH and cytochrome b. Using lipid extractants they isolated a new quininoid coenzyme which showed redox changes in respiration. They called it coenzyme Q (CoQ). CoQ was later shown to be identical to ubiquinone. 

Qrunones can accept one or two electrons to form the semiquinone anion (Q ") and the hydroquinone dianion (Q ). Single-electron reduction of a quinone is catalyzed by flavoenzymes with relatively low substrate selectivity (Kappus, 1986), for instance NADPH cytochrome P-450 reductase (E.C. 1.6.2.3), NADPH cytochrome b5 reductase (E.C. 1.6.2.2), and NADPH ubiquinone oxidoreductase (E.C. 1.6.5.3). The rate of reduction depends on several interrelated chemical properties of a quinone, including the single-electron reduction potential, as well as the number, position, and chemical characteristics of the substituent(s). The flavoenzyme DT-diphorase (NAD(P)H quinone acceptor oxidoreductase E.C. 1.6.99.2) catalyzes the two-electron reduction of a quinone to a hydroquinone. 

The proton-motive Q-cycle model, put forward by Mitchell (references 80 and 81) and by Trumpower and co-workers, is invoked in the following manner (1) One electron is transferred from ubiquinol (ubiquinol oxidized to ubisemi-quinone see Figure 7.27) to the Rieske [2Fe-2S] center at the Qo site, the site nearest the intermembrane space or p side (2) this electron can leave the bci complex via an attached cytochrome c or be transferred to cytochrome Ci (3) the reactive ubisemiquinone reduces the low-potential heme bL located closer to the membrane s intermembrane (p) side (4) reduced heme bL quickly transfers an electron to high-potential heme bn near the membrane s matrix side and (5) ubiquinone or ubisemiquinone oxidizes the reduced bn at the Qi site nearest the matrix or n side. Proton translocation results from the deprotonation of ubiquinol at the Qo site and protonation of ubisemiquinone at the Qi site. Ubiquinol generated at the Qi site is reoxidized at the Qo site (see Figure 7.27). Additional protons are transported across the membrane from the matrix (see Figure 7.26 illustrating a similar process for cytochrome b(6)f). The overall reaction can be written... 

The role of ubiquinone (coenzyme Q, 4) in transferring reducing equivalents in the respiratory chain is discussed on p. 140. During reduction, the quinone is converted into the hydroquinone (ubiquinol). The isoprenoid side chain of ubiquinone can have various lengths. It holds the molecule in the membrane, where it is freely mobile. Similar coenzymes are also found in photosynthesis (plastoquinone see p. 132). Vitamins E and K (see p. 52) also belong to the quinone/hydroquinone systems. 

The best known isoprenylated quinones are the benzoquinone ubiquinone (157) and the naphthoquinone menaquinone (158), which normally occur in natural tissues as a mixture of homologues (isoprenylogues) with different chain lengths. Analysis of the mixtures of ubiquinone or menaquinone isoprenylogues present in various species has been used in the chemotaxonomic characterization of bacteria. 

The excellent resolution of the 0-tensor components at W band has been used to measure the relaxation properties of QA in the Zn-substituted bRC of R. sphaeroides.m The experiment showed, in contrast to the respective ubiquinone radical in organic solution, an anisotropic relaxation behavior in the pulse high field ESE experiments. From the analysis of the T2 experiments a motional anisotropy of Q% in the protein pocket was deduced with a preferred libration about the C-O symmetry axis. Recently, similar experiments were also performed on Qb- in ZnbRCs. Compared to QA different echo decay time constants were found. A model was proposed in which the relaxation is related to reorientational fluctuations around the quinones specific H-bonds to the protein.142... 

Ubiquinone (also called coenzyme Q) and plasto-quinone (Fig. 10-22d, e) are isoprenoids that function as lipophilic electron carriers in the oxidation-reduction reactions that drive ATP synthesis in mitochondria and chloroplasts, respectively. Both ubiquinone and plasto-quinone can accept either one or two electrons and either one or two protons (see Fig. 19-54). 

In addition to NAD and flavoproteins, three other types of electron-carrying molecules function in the respiratory chain a hydrophobic quinone (ubiquinone) and two different types of iron-containing proteins (cytochromes and iron-sulfur proteins). Ubiquinone (also called coenzyme Q, or simply Q) is a lipid-soluble ben-zoquinone with a long isoprenoid side chain (Fig. 19-2). The closely related compounds plastoquinone (of plant chloroplasts) and menaquinone (of bacteria) play roles analogous to that of ubiquinone, carrying electrons in membrane-associated electron-transfer chains. Ubiquinone can accept one electron to become the semi-quinone radical ( QH) or two electrons to form ubiquinol (QH2) (Fig. 19-2) and, like flavoprotein carriers, it can act at the junction between a two-electron donor and a one-electron acceptor. Because ubiquinone is both small and hydrophobic, it is freely diffusible within the lipid bilayer of the inner mitochondrial membrane and can shuttle reducing equivalents between other, less mobile electron carriers in the membrane. And because it carries both electrons and protons, it plays a central role in coupling electron flow to proton movement. 

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