Glycine cleavage system: reaction mechanism, physiological significance, and hyperglycinemia

The glycine cleavage system catalyzes the following reversible reaction: Glycine + H(4)folate + NAD(+) <==> 5,10-methylene-H(4)folate + CO(2) + NH(3) + NADH + H(+)The glycine cleavage system is widely distributed in animals, plants and bacteria and consists of three intrinsic and one common components: those are i) P-protein, a pyridoxal phosphate-containing protein, ii) T-protein, a protein required for the tetrahydrofolate-dependent reaction, iii) H-protein, a protein that carries the aminomethyl intermediate and then hydrogen through the prosthetic lipoyl moiety, and iv) L-protein, a common lipoamide dehydrogenase. In animals and plants, the proteins form an enzyme complex loosely associating with the mitochondrial inner membrane. In the enzymatic reaction, H-protein converts P-protein, which is by itself a potential alpha-amino acid decarboxylase, to an active enzyme, and also forms a complex with T-protein. In both glycine cleavage and synthesis, aminomethyl moiety bound to lipoic acid of H-protein represents the intermediate that is degraded to or can be formed from N(5),N(10)-methylene-H(4)folate and ammonia by the action of T-protein. N(5),N(10)-Methylene-H(4)folate is used for the biosynthesis of various cellular substances such as purines, thymidylate and methionine that is the major methyl group donor through S-adenosyl-methionine. This accounts for the physiological importance of the glycine cleavage system as the most prominent pathway in serine and glycine catabolism in various vertebrates including humans. Nonketotic hyperglycinemia, a congenital metabolic disorder in human infants, results from defective glycine cleavage activity. The majority of patients with nonketotic hyperglycinemia had lesions in the P-protein gene, whereas some had mutant T-protein genes. The only patient classified into the degenerative type of nonketotic hyperglycinemia had an H-protein devoid of the prosthetic lipoyl residue. The crystallography of normal T-protein as well as biochemical characterization of recombinants of the normal and mutant T-proteins confirmed why the mutant T-proteins had lost enzyme activity. Putative mechanisms of cellular injuries including those in the central nervous system of patients with nonketotic hyperglycinemia are discussed.     

幻数团簇丝氨酸八聚体:结构和手性特征

自从2001年丝氨酸八聚体第一次在质谱中被观察到,这种奇特的幻数团簇就受到研究者们的广泛关注。丝氨酸八聚体具有显著的同手性优势,而且它的手性能够通过对映选择性取代反应传递给其他分子。一些研究者提出这种丝氨酸八聚体的同手性优势很可能与生命的同手性起源相关。本文综述了丝氨酸八聚体的产生、结构和手性特征等方面的研究结果和进展,其中包括运用串联质谱（MS/MS）,气相H/D交换,离子淌度,红外解离光谱等多种实验方法以及理论计算对丝氨酸八聚体及含有取代单元的八聚体的相关研究。这些结果逐步地揭示了丝氨酸八聚体的结构特点和性质,进一步加深了人们对其在手性识别和手性传递方面的作用的理解。然而,由于体系的复杂性,真正地理解其结构、同手性选择性的原因以及其在生物分子同手性起源中的作用仍是一个非常具有挑战性的问题。     

钆在柠檬酸(L-天冬氨酸)、L-丝氨酸(L-苏氨酸)三元水相体系中的化学形态

钆化学形态;钆在柠檬酸(L-天冬氨酸)、L-丝氨酸(L-苏氨酸)三元水相体系中的化学形态     

丙型肝炎病毒抑制剂的三维药效团和构效关系

通过ＣＡＴＡＬＹＳＴ软件包得到了两类ＨＣＶ ＮＳ３丝氨酸蛋白酶抑制剂的三维药效团模型。尽管这两类抑制剂具有完全不同的骨架结构,但得到的药效团却具有共同的特性。这当这两类抑制剂和受体发生相互作用时,可能采用了相似的结合模式。根据药效团模型,进行了三维构效关系的研究。结果表明,得到的药效团模型具有良好的预测能力（线性回归系数Ｒ＝０．８９）。     

蛋白质在羟基磷灰石界面吸附的研究

考察了酪蛋白酸钠(sodium caseinate,SC)和乳清分离蛋白(whey protein isolate,WPI)在表面性质不同的3种羟基磷灰石(hydroxyapatite,HA)颗粒上的界面吸附,分析了蛋白质的分子构型和HA颗粒的表面性质等因素对蛋白质在HA界面吸附的影响,重点讨论了SC和WPI肽链上磷酸化丝氨酸基团(phosphorylated serine residues,Ser-P)的数量和分布对吸附差异的影响.通过傅里叶变换红外光谱和表面电位分析发现SC和WPI无法被比表面积较小的HA颗粒有效吸附,但是在有效吸附面积较高的球状纳米HA和棒状微米HA上能够被吸附.Ser-P的存在使得SC在HA界面的吸附量更高、吸附能力更强.Ser-P数量和分布的不同则导致了SC中不同的蛋白组分在HA界面的竞争性吸附:β-酪蛋白在2μmHA界面始终存在优先吸附性;当纳米HA的浓度低于15 mg/mL时,纳米HA界面会优先吸附αs-酪蛋白.     

Electrochemical behavior of the N-nosyl-protected amino acids in N,N-dimethylformamide

The electrochemical reduction of serine, glycine, and leucine protected by the 4-nitrobenzenesulfonyl group in N,N-dimethylformamide at mercury cathode occurs at two steps. The first one at −0.8 V vs. SCE, after a one-electron transfer, leads the anion radical formation that dimerizes and adsorbs at electrode. In the second step at −1.4 V, an instable dianion forms which then cleaves. The mechanism is discussed. Published in Russian in Elektrokhimiya, 2006, Vol. 42, No. 4, pp. 377–381. The text was submitted by the authors in English.     

阴性及中性丝氨酸与纯的金属掺杂石墨烯相互作用的密度泛函理论研究

We present a theoretical study of interactions of anionic and neutral serine (Ser) on pure or metal-doped graphene surfaces using density functional theory calculations. Interactions of both types of Ser with the pure graphene surface show weak non-covalent interactions due to the formation of -COOH…π, -COO^-…π, and -OH…π interactions. On metaldoped graphene, covalent interactions to the surface dominate, due to the formation of strong metal-O and O-metal-O interactions. Furthermore, the doped Fe, Cr, Mn, Al, or Ti enhances the ability of graphene to attract both types of Ser by a combination of the adsorption energy, the density of states, the Mulliken atomic charges, and differences of electron density. At the same time, the interaction strengths of anionic Ser on various graphene surfaces are stronger than those of neutral Ser. These results provide useful insights for the rational design and development of graphene-based sensors for the two forms of Ser by introducing appropriate doped atoms. Ti and Fe are suggested to be the best choices among all doped atoms for the anionic Ser and neutral Ser, respectively.     

Ab-initio and density functional study of L- and D-forms of alanine and serine in gas phase and bulk aqueous medium

The molecular geometry of L and D-forms of alanine and serine in gas phase have been studied by using ab-initio quantum chemical calculations at the restricted Hartree-Fock (RHF) level by employing 6-31G and 6-311++G** basis sets. Subsequently, for considering the electron correlations, Density functional Calculations at the Becke3LYP (B3LYP) and Moller-Plesset second order (MP2) level of calculations have been carried out with the same basis sets for these optimized geometries. Effect of solvation in water on the optimized geometries was studied using the polarized continuum model of the self-consistent reaction field (SCRF) theory. The dipole moment, energy, polarizabilities and vibrational frequencies have been calculated in all cases. Frequency analysis was carried out to ensure that optimized geometry corresponds to a total energy minimum.     

<Emphasis Type="Italic">O</Emphasis>-nitrates of hydroxyamino acids serine and threonine

The synthesis of O-nitrates of natural hydroxyamino acids serine and threonine was described for the first time. __________ Translated from Khimiya Prirodnykh Soedinenii, No. 1, pp. 52–53, January–February, 2008.     

Similarity study of serine proteases inhibitors

Two-dimensional structural similarity calculations have been applied to estimate binding affinities of serine proteases inhibitors. 1103 trypsin binders, 1268 thrombin binders and 714 fXa binders have been used to compare experimental and predicted data. The predictions generally provide reasonable estimates of the observed binding affinities. The accuracy of the predictions depends on the size of the dataset, but not dramatically. The accuracy also depends on the number of similar structures used to make the calculations, with a number from 3 to 6 usually being optimal. The binding affinity is noticeably more sensitive to the inhibitor structure in the case of fXa relative to thrombin.