title: The effect of thrombomodulin on the cleavage of fibrinogen and fibrinogen fragments by thrombin.
abstract: Thrombomodulin acts as a linear competitive inhibitor of thrombin with respect to the substrate fibrinogen. In the present study the effect of thrombomodulin on the activity of thrombin with fragments of the A alpha and B beta chain of fibrinogen has been examined. The cleavage of fibrinopeptide A from the N-terminal disulphide knot, fragment 1-44 and fragment 1-51 of the A alpha chain was inhibited by thrombomodulin. The average value for the inhibition constant obtained with these substrates was 0.83 +/- 0.09 nM, which was in good agreement with the values obtained previously for the inhibition of thrombin by thrombomodulin with native fibrinogen as the substrate [Hofsteenge, J., Taguchi, H. & Stone, S. R. (1986) Biochem. J. 237, 243-251]. In contrast, the cleavage of fibrinopeptide A from fragment 1-23 and fragment 1-29 of the A alpha chain was not affected by thrombomodulin. Although the cleavage of the B beta chain in the intact fibrinogen molecule was inhibited by thrombomodulin [Hofsteenge, J., Taguchi, H. & Stone, S. R. (1986) Biochem. J. 237, 243-251], the release of fibrinopeptide B from the N-terminal disulphide knot and the N-terminal 118-residue fragment of the B beta chain was not inhibited by thrombomodulin. In addition, we determined the second-order rate constants of cleavage of these substrates using human thrombin. Fragments of the A alpha chain whose cleavage was inhibited by thrombomodulin were found to have values for kcat/Km that were within one order of magnitude of that for the native fibrinogen, whereas those for A alpha chain fragments whose cleavage was not inhibited by thrombomodulin were found to be more than two orders of magnitudes lower. From these results we conclude that only a relatively small portion of the A alpha chain of the fibrinogen molecule is responsible for the specific binding to thrombin that is affected by thrombomodulin. Moreover, residues 30-44 of the A alpha chain play an important role in this thrombin-fibrinogen interaction.
authors.affiliation: Friedrich-Miescher-Institut, Basel, Switzerland.
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Hofsteenge
authors.forename: S R
authors.initials: SR
authors.lastname: Stone
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001667:Binding, Competitive; D005338:Fibrin Fibrinogen Degradation Products / Q000378:metabolism*; D006801:Humans; D011817:Rabbits; D011956:Receptors, Cell Surface / Q000493:pharmacokinetics / Q000494:pharmacology*; D018179:Receptors, Thrombin; D013917:Thrombin / Q000493:pharmacokinetics / Q000494:pharmacology*
chemical_list: D005338:Fibrin Fibrinogen Degradation Products; D011956:Receptors, Cell Surface; D018179:Receptors, Thrombin; D013917:Thrombin