Contribution of active-site glutamine to rate enhancement in ubiquitin carboxy terminal hydrolases

• Published in: The FEBS journal Vol. 279; no. 6; pp. 1106 - 1118
• Main Authors: Boudreaux, David, Chaney, Joseph, Maiti, Tushar K., Das, Chittaranjan
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: 27.02.2012
• ISSN: 1742-464X; 1742-4658
• DOI: 10.1111/j.1742-4658.2012.08507.x

Ubiquitin carboxy terminal hydrolases (UCHs) are cysteine proteases featuring a classical cysteine-histidine-aspartate catalytic triad, also a highly conserved glutamine thought to be a part of the oxyanion hole. However, the contribution of this side chain to the catalysis by UCH enzymes is not known. Herein, we demonstrate that the glutamine side chain contributes to rate enhancement in UCHL1, UCHL3 and UCHL5. Mutation of the glutamine to alanine in these enzymes impairs the catalytic efficiency mainly due to a 16 to 30-fold reduction in k cat, which is consistent with a loss of approximately 2 kcal/mol in transition-state stabilization. However, the contribution to transition-state stabilization observed here is rather modest for the side chain’s role in oxyanion stabilization. Interestingly, we discovered that the carbonyl oxygen of this side chain is engaged in a C—H•••O hydrogen-bonding contact with the CεH group of the catalytic histidine. Upon further analysis, we found that this interaction is a common active-site structural feature in most cysteine proteases, including papain, belonging to families with the QCH(N/D) type of active-site configuration. It is possible that removal of the glutamine side chain might have abolished the C—H•••O interaction, which typically accounts for 2 kcal/mol of stabilization, leading to the effect on catalysis observed here. Additional studies performed on UCHL3 by mutating the glutamine to glutamate (strong C—H•••O acceptor but oxyanion destabilizer) and to lysine (strong oxyanion stabilizer but lacking C—H•••O hydrogen-bonding property) suggest that the C—H•••O hydrogen bond could contribute to catalysis.