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F Lipmann

Publications and source records attributed to F Lipmann.

At least 37 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

Transmethylation and transguanylylation in 5'-RNA capping system isolated from rat liver nuclei.

Rat liver nuclei were isolated and sonicated for extraction in order to study the capping of RNA. The guanosine 7-methyltransferase was purified from the extract by hydroxylapatite column chromatography with stepwise addition of phosphate buffer. It was assayed by using as methyl acceptor synthetic G(5')ppp(5')G and S-adenosylmethionine as donor. The enzyme appeared in a sharp peak at 160 mM. The same peak fraction was subsequently found to contain the enzyme that guanylylates short synthetic polynucleotides and low molecular weight yeast RNA as acceptors. The two enzymatic activities were separated on Sephadex G-150 chromatography, yielding guanylyltransferase and guanosine 7-methyltransferase with molecular weights of approximately 65,000 and 130,000 respectively. Guanylyltransferase was further purified by CM-Sephadex chromatography, whereby G-7-methyltransferase was completely removed. Dithiothreitol was essential for guanylylation, and 2 mM Mn2+ (optimum) was twice as active as 8 mM Mg2+ (optimum). The alpha-32P of [32P]GTP, but not its beta- or gamma-32P was incorporated into the cap structure. By using unlabeled GTP with [beta-32P]ppGpCpC-poly(A2,U2,G) as acceptor, [beta'-32P]-GpppG... was formed. Our purified transguanylylation enzyme was found to catalyze a [32P]pyrophosphate exchange with GTP, which may be useful as a rapid assay for transguanylylation.

Animals

Glucose binding and transport proteins extracted from fast-growing chicken fibroblasts.

Preconfluent or confluent fibroblasts grown in 5% serum medium yielded, without cell lysis, all the glucose-binding protein and most of the transport-stimulating activity in the cell wash fluid obtained with a 10 mM sodium octanoate-containing solution. For assay, octanoate was removed, and after the binding protein was labeled with [(14)C]glucose, the factors were chromatographed on Sephadex G-200 and the transport-stimulating and factor-bound [(14)C]glucose activities were measured. Three peaks were separated, which more or less overlapped for both functions; upon chromatography on DEAE-cellulose, these peaks yielded overlapping or separate peaks for the two functions, presumably indicating their separability. Serum, when similarly chromatographed, showed only peaks for transport which, with the exception of one major peak with both functions, more or less overlapped with those from the wash fluid. Glucose transport rates, when compared in fibroblasts grown in glucose and in fructose and in Rous sarcoma virus-transformed cells grown in glucose, were in the proportion of 1:3.7:6.3. Addition of extracted transport protein stimulated the transport of both the glucose-grown and fructose-grown normal cells but showed no effect on the transport of transformed cells. Addition of transport protein induced the formation of [(14)C]deoxyglucose 6-phosphate in amounts proportional to the increased transport of [(14)C]deoxyglucose into fibroblasts. On sodium dodecyl sulfate electrophoresis, using the tightly bound [(14)C]glucose for assay, purified binding protein yielded large fractions of 36,000 and 18,000 and small ones of 55,000 and 73,000 daltons; the 18,000-dalton fraction is supposedly the monomeric form of the binding protein.

Animals

A brief encounter.

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Biochemistry

Isolation from normal and Rous sarcoma virus-transformed chicken fibroblasts of a factor that binds glucose and stimulates its transport.

A glucose binding fraction was obtained by sucrose gradient centrifugation and Sephadex G-200 chromatopgraphy from confluent normal cells and Rous sarcoma virus-transformed fibroblasts. It was more or less loosely bound to the membrane fraction, most strongly in sarcoma cells, and most loosely in slowly growing confluent fibroblasts. In an average of three determinations, the content of binding factor was increased 2.5-fold in transformed cells, and compared reasonably well to a nearly 4-fold increase in glucose uptake. The addition of 5 mug/ml of purified glucose binding factor to the overlaying fluid in the 100-mm plates increased 7-flod the low glucose uptake of starved fibroblasts. The stimulation was an additive increment to the known stimulation by calf serum.

Avian Sarcoma Viruses

Isolation of amino acid activating subunit--pantetheine protein complexes: their role in chain elongation in tyrocidine synthesis.

Dissociation of the multienzymes of tyrocidine synthesis by prolonged incubation of crude extracts of Bacillus brevis (Dubos strain, ATCC 8185) has yielded, on Sephadex G-100 chromatography, two fractions of amino acid activating subunits, a larger one of 70,000 daltons and a smaller one of 90,000 daltons; the latter was a complex consisting of the 70,000 dalton subunit and the pantetheine-carrying protein of about 20,000 daltons. When it dissociated, the intermediate enzyme, which activates three amino acids, contained two-thirds of the subunits in the 70,000 dalton and one-third in the 90,000 dalton fraction; the heavy enzyme, which activates six amino acids, contained five-sixths of the subunits in the former fraction and one-sixth in the latter. Both fractions showed ATP-PP(i) exchange with all amino acids that are activated by the respective polyenzymes. With proline as an example, the 70,000 dalton subunit exhibited a single low-affinity binding site, which should correspond to the peripheral thiol acceptor site, whereas the 90,000 dalton subunit showed both a low-affinity binding site and an additional high-affinity site for proline; the high-affinity site is attributed to the pantetheine present on the pantetheine-carrying protein, and suggests that amino acids are translocated from the peripheral SH to the pantetheine-carrying moiety during chain elongation. This was confirmed by the observation that the 90,000 dalton complex, when incubated with the light enzyme in the presence of phenylalanine and proline, produced DPhe-Pro dipeptide that cyclized into DPhe-Pro diketopiperazine, but the 70,000 dalton activating subunit, when similarly incubated, did not. After subunit dissociation, however, no further elongation occurred after the transfer from phenylalanine to proline.

Aminoacylation

Attempts toward biosynthesis of the thyrotropin-releasing hormone and studies on its breakdown in hypothalamic tissue preparations.

Attempts were made to study the reported biosynthesis of the thyrotropin-releasing hormone (TRH = pyroGlu-His-Pro-amide) by incubating extracts of freeze-dried hypothalamic tissue with radioactively labeled precursor amino acids. Chromatographic analysis indicated a fast incorporation of radioactivity into many metabolites, including one that initially co-migrated with TRH. However, on two-dimensional chromatography, such coincidence disappeared and thus a biosynthesis of TRH could not be confirmed. A very fast degradation of TRH by serum, as well as by brain tissue preparations, was observed and was studied in detail because it could be a cause of difficulties encountered in detecting an in vitro synthesis. In hypothalamic and cortical tissue preparations, on incubation with TRH labeled with [3H]proline, fast formation of radioactively labeled deamido-TRH and liberation of prolineamide and free proline were found. On incubation of serum with labeled TRH there was a similar rapid breakdown, but different products were yielded. Degradation of TRH by serum has been reported to be strongly inhibited by pyroGlu-His-OCH3, a dipeptide analogue of TRH (10). The peptidolytic cleavage of TRH by brain enzymes, yielding proline and prolineamide as split products, was also effectively reduced using comparatively high concentrations of the dipeptide ester without, however, preventing TRH deamidation. Presuming deamido-TRH to be a biosynthetic intermediary, we decided to continue studying the synthesis of TRH with hypothalamic tissue preparations in the presence of inhibitory concentrations of the dipeptide ester, aiming at the isolation of deamido-TRH. Using [14C]proline as the label, it appeared that rather large amounts of radioactively labeled deamido-TRH, which was identified as such by vigorous purification, could be isolated from such incubates. However, only proline was incorporated, but labelled histidine or glutamic acid were not, and ATP addition was, if anything, inhibitory. Therefore, this proline incorporation could not have been due to de novo synthesis. Since the inhibiting pyroGlu-His-methyl ester was rapidly split during incubation, and, therefore, presumably inhibited the tissue peptidase by competition, we have concluded that ester-derived peptidase-bound dipeptide had reacted with [3H]proline in reverse to form the radioactive deamido-TRH in a process unrelated to biosynthesis.

Animals

The roots of bioenergetics.

Understanding metabolic energy transformation began with the realization of an 'intrusion' of phosphate into the mechanism of alcoholic fermentation. The discovery of an analogous participation of phosphate in muscle glycolysis connected the metabolic generation of energy-rich phosphate bonds fed into a common transmitter, adenosine triphosphate (ATP), with the production of mechanical energy through the finding that the phosphoryl group of creatine phosphate transferred to ATP could supply the energy for muscle contraction. In this way, a functional applicability of the energy of the phosphate bond was first shown. This observation was soon followed by the recognition that the phosphoanhydride bond of ATP provided the driving force in biosynthetic reactions; in this type of bond, metabolic energy apparently collects before it is transmitted for functional and biosynthetic use. The storage of energy in ATP was first detected in anaerobic energy-yielding reactions but soon was also found in respiratory and photosynthetic energy production. However, the mechanism by which energy derived from metabolites was converted into phosphate-bond energy in the latter processes appeared to differ from that of anaerobic energy transmission. Whereas phosphorylated compounds mediate the latter in homogeneous solutions, aerobic phosphorylation and photophosphorylation in prokaryotes seem to require special submembranous structures; and in eukaryotes, energy conversion is a function of special organelles, the mitochondria and chloroplasts. The evolutionary aspects of the transition from prokaryotes to eukaryotes are of considerable interest. In conclusion, the relevance of an apparent prokaryotic origin of the energy-transforming organelles in the eukaryotes will be commented on.

Adenosine Triphosphatases

The relation between sporulation and the induction of antibiotic synthesis and of amino acid uptake in Bacillus brevis.

The induction and localization of tyrocidine-synthesizing enzymes is shown to be parallel, during growth of Bacillus brevis (ATCC 8185, American Type Culture Collection, Rockville, Md.), with the induction of uptake of constitutive amino acids and of components of pantetheine, a coenzyme of tyrocidine synthesis. Antibiotic synthesis appears at the end of logarithmic growth when the first soluble enzymes may be obtained from homogenates. During this period, binding proteins for metabolite uptake were isolated by intensive sonication which, when studied by chromatography, were identified by the appearance of low molecular weight fractions binding the radioactively marked metabolites; their induction was prevented by addition of rifampicin. The major purpose of this study was a comparison of antibiotic production and sporulation, the progress of which was followed by electron microscopy. The onset of tyrocidine synthesis and metabolite uptake coincided with the appearance of septum formation indicating that sporulation had progressed to stage II. With the progress of spore encapsulation, the tyrocidine production migrated from the soluble fraction into the forespore, terminating with the separation of forespores from the sporangium membrane. The resulting concentration of antibiotic in the forespore may indicate its function in sporulation, the nature of which, however, was not explored.

Alanine

Isolation of a peptidyl-pantetheine-protein from tyrocidine-synthesizing polyenzymes.

The polyenzyme complex responsible for the synthesis of tyrocidine in Bacillus brevis (ATCC 8185) was found to contain 4'-phosphopantetheine, which appeared to be connected with the production of growing peptide chains. Confirmation of this assumption has now been obtained by purifying from bacterial lysates a polyenzyme-dissociation product; this was labeled with [(14)C]pantothenic acid and peptide chains containing tritiated amino acids, and had a molecular weight of 17,000. To obtain these results, organisms were grown udner conditions favorable for incorporation of radioactive pantothenic acid into tyrocidine-synthesizing enzymes. A crude lysate of the [(14)C]pantothenic acid-labeled organisms was preincubated with the tritiated amino acids to form enzyme-bound growing peptide chains. The doubly labeled fragments were purified from the polyenzyme-dissociation products produced by prolonged lysis. In a second set of experiments, the three enzymes responsible for tyrocidine synthesis, including the two polyenzymes containing pantetheine, were purified and incubated with radioactive amino acids and ATP to form polyenzyme-bound peptide chains. Thereupon, a Triton X-100 extract of the 20,000 x g fraction of crude homogenate was added to dissociate the purified polyenzymes. The dissociation products were purified and yielded, on dodecyl sulfate gel electrophoresis, peptidyl-marked products ranging in molecular weight from 90,000 to 17,000, the latter being most abundant. Electrophoresis of analogous preparations after preincubation with higher concentrations of dodecyl sulfate and dithiothreitol at 100 degrees yielded a single product of 17,000 molecular weight, indicating that the larger molecular weight fractions were aggregates thereof.

Amino Acids