Biomedical subjects

D Barra

Publications and source records attributed to D Barra.

At least 109 records · Page 6Linked to original sources

PubMed1989

Deltorphin, a novel amphibian skin peptide with high selectivity and affinity for delta opioid receptors.

With a cDNA library prepared from skin of Phyllomedusa sauvagei, the sequence of the precursor of dermorphin was elucidated recently. The sequence suggested the existence of another peptide, distantly related to dermorphin. Two variants of this peptide have now been synthesized containing either L- or D-methionine as the second amino acid. The peptide containing the D-methionine exhibited high-affinity and selectivity for delta opioid receptors in the mouse vas deferens and in rat brain homogenates. Moreover, using the synthetic peptide as marker, we could isolate small quantities of the corresponding natural peptide containing D-methionine as the second amino acid from skin extracts of Phyllomedusa sauvagei. The name deltorphin is proposed for this new peptide and its sequence is Tyr-D-Met-Phe-His-Leu-Met-Asp-NH2.

Animals↗

PubMed1989

Stoichiometry and stability of the adduct formed between human 4-aminobutyrate aminotransferase and 4-aminohex-5-enoate: sequence of a labelled peptide.

The reaction between human 4-aminobutyrate aminotransferase and the anti-epileptic drug 4-aminohex-5-enoate, an irreversible inhibitor of the enzyme, has been studied using the radiolabelled compound. The inactivated enzyme was found to lose radiolabel over a period of a few days at 37 degrees C but even in the presence of the coenzyme, pyridoxal phosphate, no enzyme activity returned. At 4 degrees C the radiolabelled inhibitor remained stably bound. The amount of enzyme-bound 4-aminohex-5-enoate was significantly less than would be expected if one mol of inhibitor was bound per mol of active site. Reversed phase chromatography of a tryptic digest of the labelled enzyme showed that, apart from material eluting at the front of the chromatogram, all of the radioactivity was in a single fraction. This fraction contained a peptide, the sequence of which indicated that it included the lysine that binds the coenzyme and that the major release of radioactivity occurred in an Edman degradation cycle corresponding to this residue.

4-Aminobutyrate Transaminase↗

PubMed1989

Deltorphins: a family of naturally occurring peptides with high affinity and selectivity for delta opioid binding sites.

Deltorphins are endogenous linear heptapeptides, isolated from skin extracts of frogs belonging to the genus Phyllomedusa, that have a higher affinity and selectivity for delta opioid binding sites than any other natural compound known. Two deltorphins with the sequence Tyr-Ala-Phe-Asp(or Glu)-Val-Val-Gly-NH2 have been isolated from skin extracts of Phyllomedusa bicolor. The alanine in position 2 is in the D configuration. These peptides, [D-Ala2]deltorphins I and II, show an even higher affinity for delta receptors than the previously characterized deltorphin, which contains D-methionine as the second amino acid. These peptides show some similarity to another constituent of Phyllomedusa skin, dermorphin, which is highly selective for mu-opioid receptors. These peptides all have the N-terminal sequence Tyr-D-Xaa-Phe, where D-Xaa is either D-alanine or D-methionine. While this structure seems to be capable of activating both mu and delta opioid receptors, differences in the C-terminal regions of these peptides are probably responsible for the observed high receptor selectivity of dermorphin and deltorphin.

Amino Acid Sequence↗

PubMed1989

Pig kidney dopa decarboxylase: inactivation by iodoacetamide and sequence of the carboxyamidomethylcysteine-containing peptide.

Pig kidney 3,4-dihydroxyphenylalanine (Dopa) decarboxylase is inactivated by iodoacetamide following pseudo-first order reaction kinetics. The apparent first order rate constant for inactivation is proportional to the concentration of iodoacetamide and a second order rate constant of 37 M-1 min-1 is obtained at pH 6.8 and 25 degrees C. Cyanogen bromide fragmentation of iodo(1-14C)acetamide - modified inactivated Dopa decarboxylase followed by trypsin digestion yields a single radioactive peptide. Automated Edman degradation reveals a heptapeptide sequence which contains labeled carboxyamidomethylcysteine. This finding and the results of the incorporation of the label from ido (1-14C)acetamide into the enzyme clearly indicate that the modification of 1 mol of SH per mol of enzyme dimer is responsible for the inactivation process. The labeled peptide, which was located by means of limited proteolysis on the fragment corresponding to the COOH-terminal third of the enzyme, has been aligned with a 7 amino acid stretch of Drosophila enzyme. Although this region appears highly conserved in the Dopa decarboxylase enzymes, the cysteinyl residue is not conserved. This observation together with the spectral binding properties of the iodoacetamide inactivated enzyme argue against a functional role for the modifiable cysteine in the mechanism of action of pig kidney enzyme. It is suggested that the loss of pig kidney decarboxylase activity produced by iodoacetamide modification might be attributable to steric hindrance. This could be due to the presence of the bulky acetamidic group on a cysteine residue at, or near, the active center or in a site of strategic importance to the maintenance of the active site topography.

Amino Acid Sequence↗

PubMed1988

Limited tryptic proteolysis of pig kidney 3,4-dihydroxyphenylalanine decarboxylase.

Pig kidney 3,4-dihydroxyphenylalanine (Dopa) decarboxylase can be nicked by trypsin with complete loss of its catalytic activity. The original dimer of subunit molecular weight of about 52,000 yields fragments of Mr 38,000 and 14,000, as seen on sodium dodecyl sulfate-gel electrophoresis. Though inactive, the nicked protein retains its native molecular weight and its capacity to bind pyridoxal-5'-phosphate (pyridoxal-P), is recognized by an antiserum raised against the native enzyme, and forms Schiff's base intermediates with aromatic amino acids in L and D forms. Thus, the nicked protein appears to be in a conformation--closely resembling that of the original enzyme--which consists of a tight association of the two tryptic fragments. Dissociation and separation of the two fragments can be achieved under denaturing conditions on a reverse-phase HPLC column. The pyridoxal-P binding site is located on the larger fragment. No NH2-terminal residue is detected in either the intact enzyme or the larger fragment, whereas analysis of the smaller fragment yields a sequence of the first 50 amino acid residues. These data indicate that the smaller fragment is located at about one-third from the COOH terminus of Dopa decarboxylase, while the larger fragment constitutes the aminic portion of the molecule. The site of trypsin cleavage seems to be in a region of the enzyme particularly susceptible to proteolysis. The results of these studies contribute to a better understanding of the structural properties of pig kidney Dopa decarboxylase and may constitute an important step toward the elucidation of the enzyme's primary structure.

5-Hydroxytryptophan↗

PubMed1988

Acidic glutathione transferase from human heart. Characterization and N-terminal sequence determination.

The anionic glutathione transferase of human heart has been purified to homogeneity by using DEAE-cellulose, affinity chromatography, and FPLC. The enzyme has an isoelectric point at pH 4.75 and has an electrophoretic mobility on SDS-PAGE identical to placental transferase pi, indicating that the heart enzyme is formed by two similar subunits of 23,000 Mr. Upon isoelectric focusing on ampholine PAG plates the enzyme recovered from FPLC gave two bands of activity at pH 4.75 and 4.9 which were reduced to essentially a single band at pH 4.75 after incubation with dithiothreitol. In the immunodiffusion experiment, the heart enzyme gave a positive precipitin line with the antibodies against transferase pi but not with antibodies prepared against the "basic" transferase of human skin or against the "near-neutral" transferase of human uterus. The substrate specificities, the sensitivities to characteristic inhibitors, the amino acid composition, together with the immunological studies, strongly indicate that the anionic enzyme of human heart is closely related to the transferase pi of human placenta. The N-terminal amino acid sequence of the first 48 residues was determined and compared with the N-terminal region of other reported human glutathione transferase sequences. The heart enzyme differs from the placental enzyme in a single residue (Trp instead of Arg in the 28th position) further supporting their similarity.

Amino Acid Sequence↗

PubMed1988

Aprotinin-like isoinhibitors in bovine organs.

Previous studies have shown that bovine spleen contains, besides aprotinin (bovine pancreatic trypsin inhibitor, BPTI), three iso-inhibitors (I-III), which are structurally and functionally very similar to BPTI. The primary structure of inhibitors I and II indicates that they are not post-translational products of BPTI, in agreement with independent findings on two homologous genes reported to be present in the bovine genome, which encode BPTI and inhibitors I and II, respectively. A careful reinvestigation on the occurrence of these inhibitors in various bovine organs is presented in this paper, based on their isolation with standard biochemical techniques and on functional and structural studies. All data indicate that the same isoinhibitors found in spleen are also present, besides BPTI, in organs such as lung, liver and pituitary gland, where they were never found before. BPTI and inhibitor II always prevail.

Amino Acid Sequence↗

PubMed1988

Isolation and characterization of small phosphorylated peptides controlling transcription "in vitro" from trout testis chromatin DNA.

Low molecular weight peptides are linked to the chromatin DNA of several tissues, from which they can be dissociated by alkaline extraction. They show very high specific activity in the control of transcription "in vitro". In this work the biochemical properties of controlling transcription peptide effectors isolated from trout testis DNA are reported. The purified peptides prevailingly contain glutamic acid, serine, aspartic acid, glycine and alanine. Studies of the peptide structure by N-terminal analysis using the dansyl chloride procedure was unsuccessful, suggesting the presence of a blocked NH2 group. At the same time the active peptides cannot be digested by carboxypeptidases. The gel filtration of the chromatin peptidic fractions on Sephadex G-25, Trisacryl GF05 or Sephadex G-15 shows that the active peptides elute as a single major peak with an elution volume corresponding to a molecular weight of about 1000. The paper electrophoresis performed at different pH and ionic strength shows that the chromatin peptides are separated in two fractions. One of them is strongly acidic and migrates towards the positive pole until pH 1.9, indicating the presence of phosphoric residues which probably exert an important role in the control of transcription "in vitro". The chromatin peptides are further purified by Sephadex G-10 and high performance liquid chromatography. The amino acid analysis of the purified peptides are reported.

Amino Acids↗

PubMed1987

Purification and characterization of rat-liver 3,4-dihydroxyphenylalanine decarboxylase.

A simple and rapid procedure, which takes advantage of the effectiveness of conventional and HPLC hydrophobic interaction, for the isolation of highly purified rat liver 3,4-dihydroxyphenylalanine decarboxylase is described in detail. Some of its structural and functional properties are reported and discussed in comparison with those of pig kidney 3,4-dihydroxyphenylalanine decarboxylase.

Amino Acids↗

PubMed1987

Primary structure of a protease isoinhibitor from bovine spleen. A possible intermediate in the processing of the primary gene product.

Sequence studies on the protease isoinhibitor I isolated from bovine spleen have revealed that it consists of two molecular variants which differ only in the presence of an additional COOH-terminal residue, asparagine, in the less abundant form. The complete amino acid sequence shows that they are composed of 65 or 66 residues and predicts Mr of 7223 or 7338, respectively. The sequences correspond exactly to the 58-residue polypeptide chain of spleen isoinhibitor II plus NH2- and COOH-terminal extensions of 2 and 5 or 6 amino acid residues, respectively. Moreover the entire sequences are located within the 100-residue structure deduced from the mRNA and DNA sequences of the putative precursor. These data support the idea that the molecular variants of isoinhibitor I are either mature proteins with distinct functional roles, or intermediates in the multistage processing of the primary product of gene expression, which eventually leads to the mature protein, i.e. inhibitor II.

Amino Acid Sequence↗

PubMed1987

The primary structure of iron superoxide dismutase from Escherichia coli.

The complete amino acid sequence of iron superoxide from Escherichia coli has been determined. The sequence was deduced from analysis of peptides obtained after cleavage of the carboxymethylated apoenzyme with trypsin. Stapholococcus aureus protease or CNBr. The polypeptide chain is made up of 192 residues and is easily aligned with the other known amino acid sequences of iron and manganese superoxide dismutases from various sources. The iron superoxide dismutase from E. coli shows a significantly higher homology with the iron enzyme from a different organism than with the manganese isoenzyme from E. coli.

Amino Acid Sequence↗

PubMed1987

The primary structure of rabbit liver cytosolic serine hydroxymethyltransferase.

The complete amino acid sequence of cytosolic serine hydroxymethyltransferase from rabbit liver was determined. The sequence was determined from analysis of peptides isolated from tryptic and cyanogen bromide cleavages of the enzyme. Special procedures were used to isolate and sequence the C-terminal and blocked N-terminal peptides. Each of the four identical subunits of the enzyme consists of 483 residues. The sequence could be easily aligned with the sequence of Escherichia coli serine hydroxymethyltransferase. The primary structural homology between the rabbit and E. coli enzymes is about 42%. The importance of the primary and predicted secondary structural homology between the two enzymes is discussed.

Amino Acid Sequence↗

PubMed1987

Kunitz-type inhibitors in human serum. Identification and characterization.

Human serum contains small amounts (approximately 0.1 mg/liter) of two protein protease inhibitors of low molecular weight (approximately 6500) and basic isoelectric point (Kunitz-type). They were purified by affinity chromatography on immobilized trypsin and ion-exchange chromatography in the fast protein liquid chromatography system. Their chemical, immunochemical, and functional properties indicate that the purified inhibitors are highly homologous with the basic pancreatic trypsin inhibitor which is widely distributed in bovids and caprids. Their inhibitory activity toward serine proteases such as plasmin and kallikrein suggests a possible regulatory role in blood clotting and fibrinolysis.

Humans↗

PubMed1987

The primary structure of iron-superoxide dismutase from Photobacterium leiognathi.

The complete amino acid sequence of iron-superoxide dismutase from Photobacterium leiognathi was determined. The sequence was deduced following characterization of the peptides obtained from tryptic, chymotryptic, and Staphylococcus aureus V-8 protease digests of the apoprotein. The amino acid sequence listed below is made up of 193 residues. It is the first complete sequence to be determined for an iron-superoxide dismutase. The iron-superoxide dismutase shows the same order of homology with the manganese-superoxide dismutases as these enzymes show among themselves. No homology was observed with the copper/zinc-containing class of superoxide dismutases. Ala-Phe-Glu-Leu-Pro-Ala-Leu-Pro-Phe-Ala-Met-Asn-Ala-Leu-Glu-Pro-His-Ile- Ser-Gln-Glu-Thr-Leu-Glu-Tyr-His-Tyr-Gly-Lys-His-His-Asn-Thr-Tyr-Val-Val- Lys-Leu-Asn-Gly-Leu-Val-Glu-Gly-Thr-Glu-Leu-Ala-Glu-Lys-Ser-Leu-Glu-Glu- Ile-Ile-Lys-Thr-Ser-Thr-Gly-Gly-Val-Phe-Asn-Asn-Ala-Ala-Gln-Val-Trp-Asn- His-Thr-Phe-Tyr-Trp-Asn-Cys-Leu-Ala-Pro-Asn-Ala-Gly-Gly-Glu-Pro-Thr-Gly- Glu-Val-Ala-Ala-Ala-Ile-Glu-Lys-Ala-Phe-Gly-Ser-Phe-Ala-Glu-Phe-Lys-Ala- Lys-Phe-Thr-Asp-Ser-Ala-Ile-Asn-Asn-Phe-Gly-Ser-Ser-Trp-Thr-Trp-Leu-Val- Lys-Asn-Ala-Asn-Gly-Ser-Leu-Ala-Ile-Val-Asn-Thr-Ser-Asn-Ala-Gly-Cys-Pro- Ile-Thr-Glu-Glu-Gly-Val-Thr-Pro-Leu-Leu-Thr-Val-Asp-Leu-Trp-Glu-His-Ala- Tyr-Tyr-Ile-Asp-Tyr-Arg-Asn-Leu-Arg-Pro-Ser-Tyr-Met-Asp-Gly-Phe-Trp-Ala- Leu-Val-Asn-Trp-Asp-Phe-Val-Ser-Lys-Asn-Leu-Ala-Ala.

Amino Acid Sequence↗

PubMed1987

Purification and characterization of new mating pheromones of the ciliate Euplotes raikovi.

Cell union in mating pairs in the ciliate Euplotes raikovi is controlled by a system of multiple mating types which are inherited with alleles codominant at the genetic locus mat and expressed via diffusible mating pheromones. The mating pheromones Er-2, Er-3, and Er-11 were purified from cells homozygous for the mat-2, mat-3, and mat-11 alleles, respectively. These pheromones are proteins of similar Mr (11,000-12,000) and acidity (pI 3.7-4.0) and are active at a concentration that varies from 2.9 X 10(-12) to 1.2 X 10(-11) M. Data on amino acid composition revealed that an unusually high amount of cysteine (12-15.7%) and poor contents of basic amino acids are common to every pheromone. On the basis of this uniformity in the main biochemical traits, which also holds for the previously purified pheromone Er-1, it was concluded that E. raikovi mating pheromones are members of a family of proteins structurally diversified from each other to varying extents.

Alleles↗

PubMed1987

[Generalized seizure induced by methohexital].

Seizures induced by methohexitone have been reported in epileptic patients. An alcoholic patient without any previous history of epilepsy had grand mal-like seizures after being given an intravenous injection of 4 mg X kg-1 methohexitone. The respective parts played by high doses of methohexitone and chronic alcoholism in the induction of seizures are discussed.

Alcoholism↗

PubMed1986

Primary structure of a cationic Cu,Zn superoxide dismutase. The sheep enzyme.

The complete amino acid sequence of Cu,Zn superoxide dismutase from sheep erythrocytes has been determined. The sequence is very similar to that of the bovine enzyme, having the same number of residues (151) and only two substitutions in the 'hypervariable' region (residues 17-30). The 5 overall substitutions confer a positive charge on the sheep enzyme at neutral pH (pI approximately equal to 8). This charge is localized outside the active site region. The catalytic efficiency of the sheep enzyme is 15% less than that of the cow enzyme, confirming the hypothesis that the enzyme activity is related to the concentration of positive surface charge near the active site channel.

Amino Acid Sequence↗

PubMed1986

Purification to apparent homogeneity of the mating pheromone of mat-1 homozygous Euplotes raikovi.

Mating type-specific mating pheromones autonomously released into the environment control cell-cell union in conjugation of the marine ciliate Euplotes raikovi. The mating pheromone, termed euplomone r-1, of cells of the homozygous mating type determined by the mat-1/mat-1 genotype was purified by means of a three-stage purification procedure which provides a yield of 79%. Starting from 10 liters of supernatant, 3.3 mg of euplomone r-1 were regularly recovered. Euplomone r-1 was identified with a protein showing a molecular weight of 12,000, an isoelectric point of 3.7, and unusually high contents of cysteine (15%) and tyrosine (5.8%). It appeared active at a concentration of 3.4 +/- 0.5 X 10(-12) M. Carbohydrate and a small colored compound, not yet identified, occurred in association with partially purified euplomone r-1 samples, whereas they were not detected in samples of the final product of purification. An acidic shift was apparently capable of destroying the carbohydrate/euplomone r-1 association, suggesting that it does not involve covalent bonds.

Amino Acids↗