title: Psychrophilic superoxide dismutase from Pseudoalteromonas haloplanktis: biochemical characterization and identification of a highly reactive cysteine residue.
abstract: A psychrophilic superoxide dismutase (SOD) has been characterized from the Antarctic eubacterium Pseudoalteromonas haloplanktis (Ph). PhSOD is a homodimeric iron-containing enzyme and displays a high specific activity, even at low temperature. The enzyme is inhibited by sodium azide and inactivated by hydrogen peroxide; it is also very sensitive to peroxynitrite, a physiological inactivator of the human mitochondrial Mn-SOD. Even though PhSOD is isolated from a cold-adapted micro-organism, its heat stability is well above the maximum growth temperature of P. haloplanktis, a feature common to other Fe- and Mn-SODs. The primary structure of PhSOD was determined by a combination of mass spectrometry and automated Edman degradation. The polypeptide chain is made of 192 amino acid residues, corresponding to a molecular mass of 21251 Da. The alignment with other Fe- and Mn-SODs showed a high amino acid identity with Fe-SOD from Vibrio cholerae (79%) and Escherichia coli (70%). A significant similarity is also shared with human mitochondrial Mn-SOD. PhSOD has the unique and highly reactive Cys57 residue, located in a variable region of the protein. The three-dimensional model of the PhSOD monomer indicates that Cys57 is included in a region, whose structural organization apparently discriminates between dimeric and tetrameric SODs. This residue forms a disulfide adduct with beta-mercaptoethanol, when this reducing agent is added in the purification procedure. The reactivity of Cys57 leads also to the formation of a disulfide bridge between two PhSOD subunits in specific denaturing conditions. The possible modification of Cys57 by physiological thiols, eventually regulating the PhSOD functioning, is discussed.
authors.affiliation: Dipartimento di Biochimica e Biotecnologie Mediche, Università di Napoli Federico II, Via S. Pansini 5, 80131 Napoli, Italy.
authors.forename: I
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Castellano
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Di Maro
authors.forename: M R
authors.initials: MR
authors.lastname: Ruocco
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Chambery
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Parente
authors.forename: M T
authors.initials: MT
authors.lastname: Di Martino
authors.forename: G
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Parlato
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Masullo
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: De Vendittis
mesh_terms: D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D003545:Cysteine / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000378:metabolism; D004791:Enzyme Inhibitors / Q000494:pharmacology; D004795:Enzyme Stability / Q000187:drug effects; D013058:Mass Spectrometry; D008958:Models, Molecular; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D008970:Molecular Weight; D031161:Pseudoalteromonas / Q000201:enzymology* / Q000378:metabolism; D016415:Sequence Alignment; D013482:Superoxide Dismutase / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000302:isolation & purification; D013696:Temperature
chemical_list: D004791:Enzyme Inhibitors; D013482:Superoxide Dismutase; D003545:Cysteine