Previous Article | Next Article ![]()
Applied and Environmental Microbiology, May 2003, p. 2603-2607, Vol. 69, No. 5
0099-2240/03/$08.00+0 DOI: 10.1128/AEM.69.5.2603-2607.2003
Copyright © 2003, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.
Graduate School of Biological Sciences, Nara Institute of Science and Technology, Ikoma, Nara 630-0192, Japan
Received 31 October 2002/ Accepted 28 January 2003
|
|
|---|
|
|
|---|
The 1,5-AG concentration in serum has been determined by high-performance liquid chromatography (9, 13, 14) and gas-liquid chromatography (10, 17, 21), but the specificities for 1,5-AG of these methods are relatively low and the procedure, which involves assaying large number of samples, is too tedious. There have been some reports about the enzymes which exhibit activity with 1,5-AG. Pyranose oxidase from Polyporus obtusus is used for enzymatic determination of 1,5-AG. This method requires removal of glucose from samples with a column (16) or conversion of glucose in samples to glucose 6-phosphate, which is not the substrate for pyranose oxidase (4). Other oxidases and dehydrogenases that oxidize 1,5-AG have been found in several microorganisms (3, 7, 8, 15). Oxidases derived from Pseudomonas sp. strain NK-8500, Pycnoporus coccineus, and Coriolus consors exhibit activity with some other sugars and sugar alcohols, such as glucose, galactose, mannitol, and xylitol, in addition to 1,5-AG (7). Dehydrogenases that react with 1,5-AG have been found in Agrobacterium sp. (3), Eupenicillium crustaceum, Hansenula california (8), and Cytophaga marinoflava (15). These enzymes, however, oxidize some other sugars and sugar alcohols, such as fructose, galactose, mannitol, and xylitol. The specificities are crucial for diagnostic use, because sugars and sugar alcohols which are substrates for the enzymes described above are present in abundance in blood.
In this study, we screened microorganisms from the soil for 1,5-AG-degrading activity that is highly specific for 1,5-AG to isolate a fungus, Trichoderma longibrachiatum strain 11-3.
|
|
|---|
Screening for 1,5-AG-utilizing microorganisms.
The enrichment culture technique was used with a medium composed of 3 g of (NH4)2SO4, 1 g of K2HPO4, 1 g of NaH2PO4, 0.5 g of MgSO4 · 7H2O, 0.1 g of CaCl2 · 2H2O, 5 g of 1,5-AG, 1 ml of a vitamin mixture (see below), and 10 ml of a metal solution (see below) in 1,000 ml of distilled water (pH 5.5). The vitamin mixture contained 1 mg of thiamine-HCl, 2 mg of riboflavin, 2 mg of Ca pantothenate, 2 mg of pyridoxine-HCl, 0.1 mg of biotin, 1 mg of p-aminobenzoic acid, 2 mg of nicotinic acid, and 0.1 mg of folic acid in 100 ml of distilled water. The metal solution contained 11.7 g of MnSO4 · 3H2O, 2.2 g of ZnSO4 · 7H2O, 0.4 g of CuSO4 · 5H2O, 0.28 g of CoCl2 · 2H2O, 0.26 g of NaMoO4 · 2H2O, 0.4 g of H3BO3, and 0.06 g of KI in 1,000 ml of distilled water. A soil sample was added to 5 ml of the medium in a test tube and shaken (300 strokes per min) at 30°C for 2 days. Then 0.01 ml of the culture was transferred to fresh medium, and cultivation was continued under the same conditions. Pure cultures were obtained by the streak-plate technique with agar plates containing the same medium.
Detection of glucose in culture filtrate.
Glucose in the culture filtrate was detected by the glucose oxidase method. The assay mixture (total volume, 3 ml) contained 100 µmol of 2-(N-morpholino)ethanesulfonic acid, 4.5 µmol of 4-aminoantipyrine, 6.0 µmol of phenol, 6.0 U of horseradish peroxidase, 100 U of glucose oxidase, and 50 µl of sample (pH 5.7). The reaction mixture was incubated at 30°C for 30 min, and the absorbance was measured at 505 nm.
Resting cell reaction with 1,5-AG.
The reaction mixture for the resting cell reaction (total volume, 1 ml) contained 100 µmol of Tris-HCl (pH 8.0), 2 µmol of 1,5-AG, and 0.1 g (wet weight) of resting cells. The reaction was carried out at 30°C for 1 to 4 h with reciprocal shaking. The reaction mixture was put on a silica gel plate (20 by 20 cm; Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany), and thin-layer chromatography (TLC) was carried out by using phenol-water (4:1, vol/vol) as the developing solvent. The spots were detected by spraying with 20% sulfuric acid.
Cultivation of the isolate.
The isolated fungus was cultivated at 28°C for 2 days in 7 liters of medium (pH 5.5) containing 40 g of glucose, 40 g of yeast extract, 24 g of NaNO3, 8 g of K2HPO4, 4 g of MgSO4 · 7H2O, and 0.8 g of CaCl2 · 2H2O (pH 5.5) by using a 10-liter jar fermentor (agitation, 500 rpm; aeration, 5.0 liters/min). Growth of the fungus was monitored by measuring wet mycelial weight after filtration on a glass filter.
Enzyme purification.
Of the SH reagents tested, dithiothreitol was the most effective in preventing enzyme inactivation and was always used in the buffer (50 mM Tris-HCl buffer [pH 8.0]) at a concentration of 2 mM unless otherwise stated. All purification procedures were carried out at 4°C.
(i) Step 1: preparation of cell extract.
Washed mycelia (100 g, wet weight) were suspended in 130 ml of 0.1 M Tris-HCl (pH 8.0) and disrupted in a glass bead mill (model 11079-S Biospec bead beater; Japan Lambda). The homogenate was centrifuged at 9,000 x g for 30 min at 4°C to remove unbroken cells and debris. The supernatant solution was used as the cell extract.
(ii) Step 2: ammonium sulfate fractionation.
To the cell extract, solid (NH4)2SO4 was added to 35% saturation with stirring, and the pH was adjusted to 7.0 with a 35% NH4OH solution. After the preparation stood for 1 h, the precipitate was separated by centrifugation at 16,000 x g for 30 min and discarded. Further (NH4)2SO4 fractionation was carried out in the similar way, and the precipitate obtained at 55% (NH4)2SO4 saturation was dissolved in the buffer. The enzyme solution was then dialyzed with the buffer for 18 h.
(iii) Step 3: DEAE-Toyopearl column chromatography.
The dialyzed solution was applied to a DEAE-Toyopearl column (diameter, 2.2 cm; length, 20 cm) equilibrated with the buffer. The absorbed protein was eluted with a linear gradient of KCl (0 to 0.5 M). Active fractions were collected and dialyzed with the buffer containing (NH4)2SO4 at 55% saturation.
(iv) Step 4: phenyl-Sepharose column chromatography.
The dialyzed solution was loaded on a phenyl-Sepharose column (diameter, 1.0 cm; length, 10 cm) equilibrated with the same buffer. After washing with the same buffer, the enzyme solution was eluted with a linear gradient of (NH4)2SO4 (55 to 0% saturation) at a flow rate of 1 ml/min.
Protein assay.
The molecular mass of the purified enzyme was determined by gel filtration on a HiLoad 16/60 Superdex 200 pg column equilibrated with 0.1 M Tris-HCl buffer (pH 8.0) containing 2 mM dithiothreitol and 0.1 M NaCl. The molecular mass of the subunits was determined by sodium dodecyl sulfate (SDS)-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (PAGE) by the method of Laemmli (6) with a 10% polyacrylamide gel (8 by 9 cm; thickness, 1 mm). Protein was stained with Coomassie brilliant blue R-250. The amount of protein was determined by the method of Bradford (2) with a protein assay kit (Bio-Rad Laboratories, Tokyo, Japan) by using bovine serum albumin as the standard.
Enzyme assay.
NAD-dependent dehydrogenase activity was measured at 30°C by determining the increase in absorbance at 340 nm with a spectrophotometer (model U-3300; Hitachi Ltd., Tokyo, Japan). The reaction mixture (total volume, 3 ml) contained 100 µmol of Tris-HCl (pH 8.0), 15 µmol of substrate, and 5.0 µmol of NAD+. The activity was calculated by using an extinction coefficient of 6,220 M-1 · cm-1 for NADH. One unit of enzyme activity was defined as the amount of enzyme that catalyzed the formation of 1 µmol of NADH per min. Specific activity was expressed in units per milligram of protein. To examine the optimum temperature and pH of the enzyme reaction, the activities were measured at various temperatures and with various buffers at 30°C, respectively. To examine enzyme stability, 0.5 U of purified 1,5-AG dehydrogenase (AGH) was incubated with 0.1 M Tris-HCl (pH 8.0) at various temperatures or with various buffers, and the residual activities were measured under the standard conditions. The enzyme activities were also measured in the standard reaction mixture containing various metal ions or chemical inhibitors at a concentration of 1 mM; the only exception was p-chloromercuribenzoic acid, which was used at a concentration of 0.1 mM. Kinetic constants were calculated by constructing double-reciprocal plots of the initial velocity of the enzyme versus various substrate concentrations in the standard reaction mixture by using 0.5 U of the enzyme.
|
|
|---|
![]() View larger version (55K): [in a new window] |
FIG. 1. Transformation of 1,5-AG to glucose by T. longibrachiatum strain 11-3. After a resting cell reaction for 4 h with 1,5-AG, the reaction mixtures were analyzed by TLC under the conditions described in the text. 1,5-AG and glucose (50 mg/ml) were used as standards.
|
Culture conditions for strain 11-3.
To facilitate large-scale production of AGH, glucose and glycerol, as well as 1,5-AG, were tested for enzyme productivity. After strain 11-3 was cultivated at 30°C for 2 days, the enzyme activity and the growth were measured. As shown in Table 1, the highest enzyme activity and the best growth were obtained when glucose was used. Strain 11-3 was cultivated at 28°C in 7 liters of medium which contained glucose and NaNO3 as carbon and nitrogen sources, respectively (Fig. 2). The growth and the enzyme activity increased until 40 h in the early stationary phase, when they reached the maximum values.
|
View this table: [in a new window] |
TABLE 1. Effect of carbon source on the formation of AGH in T. longibrachiatum strain 11-3a
|
![]() View larger version (18K): [in a new window] |
FIG. 2. Production of AGH by T. longibrachiatum strain 11-3. T. longibrachiatum strain 11-3 was cultivated at 28°C for 2 days with 7 liters of the medium described in the text by using a 15-liter jar fermentor. Symbols: , wet mycelial weight; , AGH activity (in units per milliliter of extract).
|
Properties of AGH.
AGH was purified 18-fold from the cell extract (Table 2). The purified AGH had a specific activity of 3.3 U/mg of protein. The purified preparation produced a single band on SDS-PAGE gels, indicating the apparent homogeneity of the protein (Fig. 3).
|
View this table: [in a new window] |
TABLE 2. Summary of purification of AGH from T. longibrachiatum strain 11-3
|
![]() View larger version (66K): [in a new window] |
FIG. 3. SDS-PAGE patterns of AGH from T. longibrachiatum strain 11-3 after different purification steps. A sample obtained after each purification step was applied to a 10% polyacrylamide gel containing SDS. Lane 1, molecular mass markers, including phosphorylase b (94 kDa), bovine serum albumin (67 kDa), ovalbumin (43 kDa), carbonic anhydrase (30 kDa), soybean trypsin inhibitor (20.1 kDa), and -lactalbumin (14.4 kDa); lane 2, cell extract of T. longibrachiatum strain 11-3; lane 3, preparation after ammonium sulfate precipitation; lane 4, preparation after DEAE-Toyopearl column chromatography; lane 5, preparation after phenyl-Sepharose chromatography; lane 6, preparation after Superdex 200 gel filtration.
|
![]() View larger version (14K): [in a new window] |
FIG. 4. Effects of temperature and pH on the activity (A and B) and stability (C and D) of AGH. (B and D) Symbols: , McIlvaine buffer; , Tris-HCl buffer; , glycine-NaOH buffer.
|
|
View this table: [in a new window] |
TABLE 3. Substrate specificity of AGH from T. longibrachiatum strain 11-3a
|
![]() View larger version (14K): [in a new window] |
FIG. 5. Enzymatic measurement of 1,5-AG with AGH. (A) Enzyme activities measured at various concentrations of 1,5-AG under the standard conditions but with an excess amount of purified AGH (0.5 U). (B and C) Assay of 1,5-AG carried out in a similar way but with 110 mg of glucose per dl (B) or 0.56 mg of fructose per dl (C).
|
|
|
|---|
AGH from T. longibrachiatum 11-3 was unique in its substrate specificity. This enzyme did not exhibit activity with any sugar other than 1,5-AG or with any sugar alcohol. The enzyme gained prominence because of its substrate specificity compared with the specificities of the other enzymes described so far. This characteristic of AGH is adequate for diagnostic application of the enzyme. In this study, a preliminary examination of enzymatic measurement of 1,5-AG was carried out. A linear relationship between the concentration of 1,5-AG and the enzyme activity was obtained by using reaction mixtures with an excess amount of purified AGH. It was possible that AGH exhibited activity with glucose in the serum sample because large amounts of glucose (50 times the amount of 1,5-AG) are present in blood serum. Thus, 1,5-AG samples containing 110 mg of glucose per dl, which is a border value for the serum glucose concentration for diabetes diagnosis, were used for the AGH assay. As a result, we found that the relationship did not change with or without glucose (Fig. 5B). The purified AGH also exhibited trace activity with fructose. Fructose is produced from ingested sucrose and then inverts to glucose, but the amount of fructose is not negligible (0.56 mg/dl in normal subjects). As shown in Fig. 5C, the presence of fructose at a physiological level did not affect the 1,5-AG determination with AGH (Fig. 5C). The activity with glyceraldehyde may not be an obstacle to practical use because glyceraldehyde is thought not to be present in serum. Furthermore, the enzyme activity remained after incubation at 70°C for 10 min and was stable after storage at 4°C for at least 6 months. These results suggested that AGH is a novel enzyme and is adequate for diagnosing diabetes mellitus.
1,5-AG is generally found in animals and plants. 1,5-AG in animals is produced from glucose and is ingested with food (20). However, its physiological role is unknown. Shiga et al. have reported that 1,5-AG is synthesized and phosphorylated in Escherichia coli C600. They have also shown that E. coli C600 synthesizes 1,5-AG when glucose is exhausted in the medium (12) and that E. coli takes 1,5-AG back from the medium and phosphorylates it to 1,5-AG 6-phosphate. These authors suggested that 1,5-AG and/or its phosphate may be a signal substance in cell-to-cell communication for bacterial growth (11). T. longibrachiatum strain 11-3 mycelia converted 1,5-AG into glucose in the resting cell reaction. AGH activity was detected after the fungus was cultivated on medium containing glucose as a carbon source and then immediately decreased in the stationary phase of the growth. These results suggest that AGH may also be an engaged signal for starvation for carbon sources in strain 11-3, as it is in E. coli C600.
|
|
|---|
This article has been cited by other articles:
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Copyright © 2009 by the American Society for Microbiology. For an alternate route to Journals.ASM.org, visit: http://intl-journals.asm.org | More Info»