title: Fluorometric microassays for the determination of cathepsin L and cathepsin S activities in tissue extracts.
abstract: We established a continuous semi-microassay, and for large-scale studies both a stopped and a continuous microtiter plate assay for the fluorometric determination of cathepsin L and cathepsin S activities in body fluids, tissues or cell extracts in the presence of cathepsin B. For the detection of enzymatic activities we used the synthetic substrate Z-Phe-Arg-AMC, and for discrimination between cathepsin L, S and cathepsin B the specific inhibitor CA-074 for blocking interfering cathepsin B activities was applied. Furthermore, we took advantage of the stability of cathepsin S at pH 7.5 for further differentiation between cathepsin L and cathepsin S activities. The kinetic assays were characterized in terms of imprecision, analytical sensitivity, accuracy and substrate concentration. The within-run coefficients of variation were found to be 4.9%-7.2% for the continuous semi-microassay, 10.3%-11.7% for the stopped, and 4.5%-11.8% for the continuous microtiter plate assay. The between-days coefficients of variation for the continuous semi-microassay were 8.1%-8.9%, while for the stopped and continuous microtiter plate assays the coefficients were 11.2%-13.5% and 5.8%-12.2%, respectively. Compared to the continuous semi-microassay, the stopped and the continuous microtiter plate assays showed 3-fold and 11-fold higher sensitivity, respectively. Comparison between the continuous enzyme activity assays at substrate concentrations of 40 microM and 200 microM demonstrated a significant correlation of r = 0.97 and r = 0.99, respectively. The newly developed microtiter plate assay will allow efficient, sensitive and high precision determination of cathepsin L and cathepsin S activities in large-scale studies of cysteine-cathepsin dependent diseases.
authors.affiliation: Thoraxhospital Heidelberg-Rohrbach, Heidelberg, Germany.
authors.forename: B
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Werle
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Staib
authors.forename: B
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Jülke
authors.forename: W
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Ebert
authors.forename: P
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Zladoidsky
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Sekirnik
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Kos
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Spiess
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D056668:Cathepsin L; D002403:Cathepsins / Q000378:metabolism*; D003546:Cysteine Endopeptidases; D010450:Endopeptidases; D006801:Humans; D007700:Kinetics; D008875:Middle Aged; D013050:Spectrometry, Fluorescence; D013379:Substrate Specificity; D014020:Tissue Extracts
chemical_list: D014020:Tissue Extracts; D002403:Cathepsins; D010450:Endopeptidases; D003546:Cysteine Endopeptidases; C534281:CTSL protein, human; D056668:Cathepsin L; C028217:cathepsin S