title: Application of an enzyme chip to the microquantification of l-phenylalanine.
abstract: We describe here a new microquantification method of l-phenylalanine concentration in an extract from a dried blood spot by using the diaphorase-resazurin system. To miniaturize the fluorometric enzymatic microplate assay for the diagnosis of phenylketonuria, an enzyme chip immobilized with His-tag fused phenylalanine dehydrogenase (PheDH) was developed. His-tag fused PheDH was immobilized on the surface of nickel-coated slide glass. A microarray sheet (8 x 30 well) was fabricated with poly(dimethylsiloxane) (PDMS) using the photolithographic technique. An enzyme reaction chamber in a double-layered structure was constructed with different types of microarray PDMS sheets on the surface of Ni-coated slide glass immobilized with His-tagged PheDH. To evaluate the affinity toward the Ni-chelating ligand, eight kinds of His-tagged PheDH variants were constructed and expressed. (His)(6)- and (His)(9)-PheDH variants at the N terminus showed high adsorption ratio to Ni-chelating ligand. The V(max) and k(cat) values of the (His)(6)-PheDH variant at the N terminus for l-phenylalanine were higher than those of the (His)(9)-PheDH variant, and the (His)(6)-PheDH variant was found to be most suitable for immobilization onto nickel-coated slide glass. Fluorescence formed by resazurin-coupled enzymatic reaction (in a 0.2-microl reaction mixture) on the enzyme chip exhibited good linearity and a correlation coefficient up to 12.8 mg/dl of the l-phenylalanine-containing sample extracted from a dried blood spot on filter paper.
authors.affiliation: Biotechnology Research Center, Toyama Prefectural University, 5180 Kurokawa, Imizu, Toyama 939-0398, Japan.
authors.forename: Shinjiro
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Tachibana
authors.forename: Masayasu
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Suzuki
authors.forename: Yasuhisa
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Asano
mesh_terms: D000594:Amino Acid Oxidoreductases / Q000378:metabolism*; D001801:Blood Stains; D006639:Histidine / Q000737:chemistry; D006801:Humans; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D008832:Microchemistry / Q000379:methods; D015997:Neonatal Screening / Q000379:methods*; D010649:Phenylalanine / Q000097:blood*; D010661:Phenylketonurias / Q000097:blood* / Q000175:diagnosis; D040081:Protein Array Analysis / Q000379:methods*; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity
chemical_list: D010649:Phenylalanine; D006639:Histidine; D000594:Amino Acid Oxidoreductases; C022342:phenylalanine oxidase