Chemistry: molecular biology and microbiology – Enzyme – proenzyme; compositions thereof; process for... – Hydrolase
Reexamination Certificate
2001-08-23
2002-10-08
Achutamurthy, Ponnathaput (Department: 1652)
Chemistry: molecular biology and microbiology
Enzyme , proenzyme; compositions thereof; process for...
Hydrolase
C536S063000, C435S023000, C435S069100, C435S325000, C435S252300, C435S320100
Reexamination Certificate
active
06461850
ABSTRACT:
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention is in the field of protease proteins that are related to the choriolytic hatching protease subfamily, recombinant DNA molecules, and protein production. The present invention specifically provides novel peptides and proteins that effect protein cleavage/processing/turnover and nucleic acid molecules encoding such peptide and protein molecules, all of which are useful in the development of human therapeutics and diagnostic compositions and methods.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The proteases may be categorized into families by the different amino acid sequences (generally between 2 and 10 residues) located on either side of the cleavage site of the protease.
The proper functioning of the cell requires careful control of the levels of important structural proteins, enzymes, and regulatory proteins. One of the ways that cells can reduce the steady state level of a particular protein is by proteolytic degradation. Further, one of the ways cells produce functioning proteins is to produce pre or pro-protein precursors that are processed by proteolytic degradation to produce an active moiety. Thus, complex and highly-regulated mechanisms have been evolved to accomplish this degradation.
Proteases regulate many different cell proliferation, differentiation, and signaling processes by regulating protein turnover and processing. Uncontrolled protease activity (either increased or decreased) has been implicated in a variety of disease conditions including inflammation, cancer, arteriosclerosis, and degenerative disorders.
An additional role of intracellular proteolysis is in the stress-response. Cells that are subject to stress such as starvation, heat-shock, chemical insult or mutation respond by increasing the rates of proteolysis. One function of this enhanced proteolysis is to salvage amino acids from non-essential proteins. These amino acids can then be re-utilized in the synthesis of essential proteins or metabolized directly to provide energy. Another function is in the repair of damage caused by the stress. For example, oxidative stress has been shown to damage a variety of proteins and cause them to be rapidly degraded.
The International Union of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (IUBMB) has recommended to use the term peptidase for the subset of peptide bond hydrolases ( Subclass E.C 3.4.). The widely used term protease is synonymous with peptidase. Peptidases comprise two groups of enzymes: the endopeptidases and the exopeptidases, which cleave peptide bonds at points within the protein and remove amino acids sequentially from either N or C-terminus respectively. The term proteinase is also used as a synonym word for endopeptidase and four mechanistic classes of proteinases are recognized by the IUBMB: two of these are described below (also see:
Handbook of Proteolytic Enzymes
by Barrett, Rawlings, and Woessner A P Press, NY 1998). Also, for a review of the various uses of proteases as drug targets, see: Weber M, Emerging treatments for hypertension: potential role for vasopeptidase inhibition; Am J Hypertens November 1999;12(11 Pt 2):139S-147S; Kentsch M, Otter W, Novel neurohormonal modulators in cardiovascular disorders. The therapeutic potential of endopeptidase inhibitors, Drugs R D April 1999;1(4):331-8; Scarborough R M, Coagulation factor Xa: the prothrombinase complex as an emerging therapeutic target for small molecule inhibitors, J Enzym Inhib 1998;14(1):15-25; Skotnicki J S, et al., Design and synthetic considerations of matrix metalloproteinase inhibitors, Ann N Y Acad Sci Jun. 30, 1999;878:61-72; McKerrow J H, Engel J C, Caffrey C R, Cysteine protease inhibitors as chemotherapy for parasitic infections, Bioorg Med Chem April 1999;7(4):639-44; Rice K D, Tanaka R D, Katz B A, Numerof R P, Moore W R, Inhibitors of tryptase for the treatment of mast cell-mediated diseases, Curr Pharm Des October 1998;4(5):381-96; Materson B J, Will angiotensin converting enzyme genotype, receptor mutation identification, and other miracles of molecular biology permit reduction of NNT Am J Hypertens August 1998;11(8 Pt 2):138S-142S
Metalloprotease
The metalloproteases may be one of the older classes of proteinases and are found in bacteria, fungi as well as in higher organisms. They differ widely in their sequences and their structures but the great majority of enzymes contain a zinc atom which is catalytically active. In some cases, zinc may be replaced by another metal such as cobalt or nickel without loss of the activity. Bacterial thermolysin has been well characterized and its crystallographic structure indicates that zinc is bound by two histidines and one glutamic acid. Many enzymes contain the sequence HEXXH, which provides two histidine ligands for the zinc whereas the third ligand is either a glutamic acid (thermolysin, neprilysin, alanyl aminopeptidase) or a histidine (astacin). Other families exhibit a distinct mode of binding of the Zn atom. The catalytic mechanism leads to the formation of a non covalent tetrahedral intermediate after the attack of a zinc-bound water molecule on the carbonyl group of the scissile bond. This intermediate is further decomposed by transfer of the glutamic acid proton to the leaving group.
Metalloproteases contain a catalytic zinc metal center which participates in the hydrolysis of the peptide backbone (reviewed in Power and Harper, in Protease Inhibitors, A. J. Barrett and G. Salversen (eds.) Elsevier, Amsterdam, 1986, p. 219). The active zinc center differentiates some of these proteases from calpains and trypsins whose activities are dependent upon the presence of calcium. Examples of metalloproteases include carboxypeptidase A, carboxypeptidase B, and thermolysin.
Metalloproteases have been isolated from a number of procaryotic and eucaryotic sources, e.g.
Bacillus subtilis
(McConn et al., 1964, J. Biol. Chem. 239:3706);
Bacillus megaterium;
Serratia (Miyata et al., 1971, Agr. Biol. Chem. 35:460);
Clostridium bifermentans
(MacFarlane et al., 1992, App. Environ. Microbiol. 58:1195-1200),
Legionella pneumophila
(Moffat et al., 1994, Infection and Immunity 62:751-3). In particular, acidic metalloproteases have been isolated from broad-banded copperhead venoms (Johnson and Ownby, 1993, Int. J. Biochem. 25:267-278), rattlesnake venoms (Chlou et al., 1992, Biochem. Biophys. Res. Commun. 187:389-396) and articular cartilage (Treadwell et al., 1986, Arch. Biochem. Biophys. 251:715-723). Neutral metalloproteases, specifically those having optimal activity at neutral pH have, for example, been isolated from Aspergillus sojae (Sekine, 1973, Agric. Biol. Chem. 37:1945-1952). Neutral metalloproteases obtained from Aspergillus have been classified into two groups, npI and npII (Sekine, 1972, Agric. Biol. Chem. 36:207-216). So far, success in obtaining amino acid sequence information from these fungal neutral metalloproteases has been limited. An npII metalloprotease isolated from Aspergillus oryzae has been cloned based on amino acid sequence presented in the literature (Tatsumi et al., 1991, Mol. Gen. Genet. 228:97-103). However, to date, no npI fungal metalloprotease has been cloned or sequenced. Alkaline metalloproteases, for example, have been isolated from
Pseudomonas aeruginosa
(Baumann et al., 1993, EMBO J 12:3357-3364) and the insect pathogen
Xenorhabdus luminescens
(Schmidt et al., 1998, Appl. Environ. Microbiol. 54:2793-2797).
Metalloproteases have been devided into several distinct families based primarily on activity and sturcture: 1) water nucleophile; water bound by single zinc ion ligated to two His (within the motif HEXXH) and Glu, His or Asp; 2) water nucleophile; water bound by single zinc ion ligated to His, Glu (within the motif HXXE) and His; 3) water nucleophile; water bound by single zinc ion ligated to His, Asp and His; 4) Water nucleophile; water bound by single zinc ion ligated to two His (within the motif HXXEH) and Glu and 5) water nucleophile; water bound by two zinc ions ligated by Lys, Asp, Asp, Asp, Glu.
Examples of members of the metalloproteinase family includ
Beasley Ellen M.
Li Zhenya
Achutamurthy Ponnathaput
Applera Corporation
Celera Genomics
Karjala Justin
Ramirez Delia
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