title: The isolation and properties of collagenolytic proteases from crab hepatopancreas.
abstract: A mixture of collagenolytic proteases has been isolated from the Kamchatka crab hepatopancreas. The four individual enzymes were further separated with FPLC and partially characterized. Crab collagenolytic proteases possess a high activity against different types of collagen, especially against calf skin collagen Type III and bovine lens capsule collagen Type IV, which is resistant to the microbial Clostridium sp. collagenases. In contrast with microbial collagenases the crab enzymes are good general proteases, able to cleave standard synthetic and protein substrates and possess a chymotrypsin-, trypsin- and elastase-like specificity. N-Terminal sequence analysis revealed that crab collagenolytic proteases had evolved from a trypsin-like ancestor. Crab proteases, structurally belonging to the trypsin-like enzymes, nevertheless, possess the unique ability, among this class of enzymes, to cleave the native insoluble collagen. It seems that crab collagenolytic proteases and true metalloenzyme vertebrate and microbial collagenases have certain common structural features particularly in the regions of their substrate binding site.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Molecular Genetics, USSR Academy of Science, Moscow.
authors.forename: O A
authors.initials: OA
authors.lastname: Klimova
authors.forename: S I
authors.initials: SI
authors.lastname: Borukhov
authors.forename: N I
authors.initials: NI
authors.lastname: Solovyeva
authors.forename: T O
authors.initials: TO
authors.lastname: Balaevskaya
authors.lastname: Strongin AYa
mesh_terms: D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D000818:Animals; D003386:Brachyura; D002852:Chromatography, Ion Exchange; D004064:Digestive System / Q000201:enzymology*; D003012:Microbial Collagenase / Q000235:genetics / Q000302:isolation & purification* / Q000378:metabolism; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D009842:Oligopeptides; D010447:Peptide Hydrolases / Q000235:genetics; D012689:Sequence Homology, Nucleic Acid; D013379:Substrate Specificity
chemical_list: D009842:Oligopeptides; D010447:Peptide Hydrolases; D003012:Microbial Collagenase