Unfolding of Bovine Heart Cytochrome c Induced by Urea and Guanidine Hydrochloride

The unfolding of bovine heart cytochrome c induced by urea and guanidine hydrochloride was studied through their intrinsic fluorescence emission spectra, fluorescence phase diagrams, fluorescence quenching, size‐exclusion chromatographies, native polyacrylamide gel electrophoreses and deactivation profiles. The results showed that during their unfolding in urea and guanidine hydrochloride solutions, bovine heart cytochrome c molecules existed only in a unimolecular form and their bi‐molecular and/or poly‐molecular aggregates and aggregate precipitates were not formed all along. When the urea and guanidine hydrochloride concentrations in denaturation solution were separately about 6.0 and 3.0 mol/L, they could be completely deactivated and almost all of the tryptophan residues originally embedded in the interior of their molecules were exposed to the surface of their molecules. Different from the unfolding of the most often used horse heart cytochrome c, that of bovine heart cytochrome c induced by urea and guanidine hydrochloride was separately a completely co‐operative procedure and followed a two‐state model.