Synthesis and biological activity of N-sulfonylphosphoramidates: probing the electrostatic preferences of alkaline phosphatase.

N-Sulfonylphosphoramidates have been synthesized to investigate the electrostatic requirements for binding to alkaline phosphatase. Alkyl- and aryl N-benzylated sulfonamides were phosphorylated with bromophosphates or synthesized via phosphoramidite chemistry in moderate yields (44-77%.) The resulting tribenzylated N-sulfonylphosphoramidates may be deprotected in one step to give the free acids in quantitative yields. Physical data of N-sulfonylphosphoramidates, including pK(a)'s and stability toward hydrolysis, were determined. Inhibition data suggests that AP does not bind trianionic N-sulfonylphosphoramidates better than dianionic N-sulfonylphosphoramidates, although N-sulfonylphosphoramidates are bound tighter than N-phenylphosphoramidate. k(cat) for the hydrolysis of N-sulfonylphosphoramidates by bovine and E. coli alkaline phosphatases is 10-60% that of p-nitrophenyl phosphate.

Synthesis and reactivity of polydisulfonimides.

The first synthesis of alkyl disulfonimide oligomers is presented. In the process of synthesizing these oligomers, previously unreported reactivity of the N-substituted disulfonimide functional group was discovered. Under basic conditions, unexpected lengthening of the oligomers occurs through a "transdisulfonimidation" reaction, whereby new disulfonimides are synthesized from existing ones by reaction with sulfonamide anion. This process appears to proceed via formation of a sulfene intermediate. Support for the E1cB(Rev) mechanism includes isotope scrambling, substituent effects, and sulfene trapping.

Investigation of enzyme kinetics using quench-flow techniques with MALDI-TOF mass spectrometry.

Matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization time-of-flight (MALDI-TOF) mass spectrometry is combined off-line with rapid chemical quench-flow methods to investigate the pre-steady-state kinetics of a protein-tyrosine phosphatase (PTPase). PTPase kinetics are generally interrogated spectrophotometrically by the employment of an artificial, chromophoric substrate. However, that methodology places a constraint on the experiment, hampering studies of natural, biochemically relevant substrates that do not incorporate a chromophore. The mass spectrometric assay reported herein is based on the formation of a covalent phosphoenzyme intermediate during substrate turnover. This species is generated in the reaction regardless of the substrate studied and has a molecular weight 80 Da greater than that of the native enzyme. By following the appearance of this intermediate in a time-resolved manner, we can successfully measure pre-steady-state kinetics, regardless of the incorporation of a chromophore. The strengths of the mass-spectrometric assay are its uniform response to all substrates, simple and direct detection of covalent enzyme-substrate intermediates, and facile identification of enzyme heterogeneities that may affect enzymatic activity.

Alternate modes of binding in two crystal structures of alkaline phosphatase-inhibitor complexes.

Two high resolution crystal structures of Escherichia coli alkaline phosphatase (AP) in the presence of phosphonate inhibitors are reported. The phosphonate compounds, phosphonoacetic acid (PAA) and mercaptomethylphosphonic acid (MMP), bind competitively to AP with dissociation constants of 5.5 and 0.6 mM, respectively. The structures of the complexes of AP with PAA and MMP were refined at high resolution to crystallographic R-values of 19.0 and 17.5%, respectively. Refinement of the AP-inhibitor complexes was carried out using X-PLOR. The final round of refinement was done using SHELXL-97. Crystallographic analyses of the inhibitor complexes reveal different binding modes for the two phosphonate compounds. The significant difference in binding constants can be attributed to these alternative binding modes observed in the high resolution X-ray structures. The phosphinyl group of PAA coordinates to the active site zinc ions in a manner similar to the competitive inhibitor and product inorganic phosphate. In contrast, MMP binds with its phosphonate moiety directed toward solvent. Both enzyme-inhibitor complexes exhibit close contacts, one of which has the chemical and geometrical potential to be considered an unconventional hydrogen bond of the type C-H...X.

The road less travelled: taming phosphatases.

Phosphatases are important in signal transduction, bacterial pathogenesis and several human diseases. So far, however, it is their opposite numbers, the kinases, that have received more attention from chemists. Recent progress in inhibitor development offers hope that new probes of cellular processes, and perhaps novel therapeutic agents, may soon become available.

Characterization and purification of neutrophil ecto-phosphatidic acid phosphohydrolase.

Phosphatidic acid and its derivatives play potentially important roles as extracellular messengers in biological systems. An ecto-phosphatidic acid phosphohydrolase (ecto-PAPase) has been identified which effectively regulates neutrophil responses to exogenous phosphatidic acid by converting the substrate to diacylglycerol. The present study was undertaken to characterize this ecto-enzyme on intact cells and to isolate the enzyme from solubilized neutrophil extracts. In the absence of detergent, short chain phosphatidic acids were hydrolysed most effectively by neutrophil plasma membrane ecto-PAPase; both saturated and unsaturated long chain phosphatidic acids were relatively resistant to hydrolysis. Both long (C18:1) and short (C8) chain lyso-phosphatidic acids were hydrolysed at rates comparable with those observed for short chain (diC8) phosphatidic acid. Activity of the ecto-enzyme accounted for essentially all of the N-ethylmaleimide-insensitive, Mg2+-independent PAPase activity recovered from disrupted neutrophils. At 37 degrees C and pH7.2, the apparent Km for dioctanoyl phosphatidic acid (diC8PA) was 1. 4x10(-3) M. Other phosphatidic acids and lysophosphatidic acids inhibited hydrolysis of [32P]diC8PA in a rank order that correlated with competitor solubility, lysophosphatidic acids and unsaturated phosphatidic acids being much more effective inhibitors than long chain saturated phosphatidic acids. Dioleoyl (C18:1) phosphatidic acid was an unexpectedly strong inhibitor of activity, in comparison with its ability to act as a direct substrate in the absence of detergent. Other inhibitors of neutrophil ecto-PAPase included sphingosine, dimethyl- and dihydro-sphingosine, propranolol, NaF and MgCl2. Of several leucocyte populations isolated from human blood by FACS, including T cells, B cells, NK lymphocytes and monocytes, ecto-PAPase was most prevalent on neutrophils; erythrocytes were essentially devoid of activity. A non-hydrolysable, phosphonate analogue of phosphatidic acid, phosphonate 1, efficiently solubilized catalytic activity from intact neutrophils without causing cell disruption or increasing permeability. Enzyme activity in solubilized extracts was purified in the absence of detergent by successive heparin-Sepharose, gel filtration and anion exchange chromatography. By assaying activity in renatured SDS/polyacrylamide gel slices, the molecular mass of neutrophil ecto-PAPase was estimated to be between 45 and 52 kDa, similar to the molecular mass of previously purified plasma membrane PAPases. Since a large portion of neutrophil plasma membrane PAPase is available for hydrolysis of exogenous substrates, ecto-PAPase may play an important role in regulating inflammatory cell responses to extracellular phosphatidic acid in biological systems.

Estrone sulfatase: probing structural requirements for substrate and inhibitor recognition.

The enzyme-catalyzed desulfation of steroids is a transformation that plays an important role in steroid biosynthesis. Conversion of steroid sulfates to unconjugated steroids may provide a source of steroids for processes such as steroid transport and the growth and proliferation of breast cancer. Steroid sulfatase catalyzes the hydrolysis of 3beta-hydroxysteroid sulfates. To identify structural features important in enzyme-inhibitor interaction, a variety of steroidal and non-steroidal phosphate esters were synthesized and tested as inhibitors of steroid sulfatase activity. We report that the basic structure for enzyme-inhibitor binding does not include the steroid nucleus. Furthermore, the hydrophobicity of the non-steroidal phosphates was determined to be an important factor for optimal inhibition. The monoanionic form of the phosphorylated compounds was found to be the inhibitory species. The best non-steroidal inhibitor of steroid sulfatase activity was n-lauroyl tryamine phosphate with a Ki of 3.6 microM and 520 nM at pH 7.5 and 7.0. The poorest non-steroidal based inhibitor of sulfatase activity was tetrahydronaphthyl phosphate with a Ki of 870 and 360 microM at pH 7.5 and 7.0.

Quiescent affinity inactivators of protein tyrosine phosphatases.

alpha-Halobenzylphosphonates were investigated as possible inactivators of protein tyrosine phosphatases (PTPases). These compounds inactivate the Yersinia PTPase (Yop51*delta 162) in a time- and concentration-dependent fashion. This inactivation is active-site directed and irreversible, and is surprisingly rapid in light of the stability of the alpha-halobenzylphosphonates toward nucleophiles in solution. The potential of these molecules for probing the stereochemistry of PTPase inactivation, as well as for providing a useful paradigm for the design of more potent PTPase inhibitors is discussed.

Charged with meaning: the structure and mechanism of phosphoprotein phosphatases.

Many phosphatases require two metal ions for catalysis. New structural information on two serine/threonine phosphatases offers insight into how the metals contribute to catalysis. A comparison with the structures of protein tyrosine phosphatases, which do not use metal ions, shows that the only similarity at the active site is that of charge.

4-(Fluoromethyl)phenyl phosphate acts as a mechanism-based inhibitor of calcineurin.

The compound 4-(fluoromethyl)phenyl phosphate (FMPP), recently shown to be a mechanism-based inhibitor of prostatic acid phosphatase (Myers, J.K., and Widlanski, T.S. (1993) Science 262, 1451-1453), was examined for its effect on calcineurin. This compound inhibits calcineurin in a time-dependent, first order manner. Inactivation with [3H]FMPP led to a specific labeling of the catalytic subunit with a stoichiometry of 0.75 mol of label/mol of protein. A related substrate, 4-methylphenyl phosphate, is able to protect calcineurin from FMPP-mediated inhibition. Scavenging nucleophiles, such as cysteine, do not affect the rate of inhibition when included in the reaction. In addition, extensive dialysis indicates that inhibition is essentially irreversible. These results demonstrate that FMPP inactivates calcineurin in a mechanism-based fashion by forming a covalent adduct with calcineurin A, the catalytic subunit.

A novel ecto-phosphatidic acid phosphohydrolase activity mediates activation of neutrophil superoxide generation by exogenous phosphatidic acid.

Phosphatidic acid (PA) added to intact cells activates a variety of processes including mitogenesis in fibroblasts and superoxide generation in neutrophils. We have investigated the mechanism of activation of superoxide generation in intact human neutrophils by a short-chain (dioctanoyl) PA (diC8PA). After a lag, diC8PA caused a high rate of superoxide production (19.6 nmol of cytochrome c reduced/min/10(6) cells). Activation did not require extracellular Ca2+ and coincided with near quantitative conversion of diC8PA to dioctanoylglycerol (diC8-glycerol). diC8PA also activated cellular phospholipase D with release of long-chain PA and secondary production of long-chain diradylglycerol (sn-1,2-diacylglycerol and 1-O-alkyl-2-acylglycerol). The metabolism of diC8PA to diC8-glycerol was catalyzed by a novel PA phosphohydrolase on the outer leaflet of the plasma membrane as demonstrated by the exclusive release of Pi into the extracellular medium. This enzyme also showed activity toward PA containing long-chain unsaturated fatty acids. The ecto-PA phosphohydrolase differed from the intracellular PA phosphohydrolase based on its relative insensitivity to desipramine and N-ethylmaleimide. The enzyme was also present in Chinese hamster ovary (CHO) cells and its activity did not change in transfected CHO cells expressing the two membrane-associated isoforms of alkaline phosphatase, indicating that the PA phosphohydrolase was not alkaline phosphatase. Non-hydrolyzable phosphonate analogs of diC8PA poorly stimulated superoxide production. Activation of superoxide generation by diC8PA was inhibited by staurosporine, suggesting a protein kinase C-dependent mechanism. We suggest that the action of a novel ecto-PA phosphohydrolase permits exogenously added short-chain PA to serve as "timed-release diacylglycerol" and that its biological effects in neutrophils are secondary to diacylglycerol-mediated protein kinase C activation.

Mechanism-based inactivation of prostatic acid phosphatase.

Protein phosphatases play important roles in the regulation of cell growth and metabolism, yet little is known about their enzymatic mechanism. By extrapolation from data on inhibitors of other types of hydrolases, an inhibitor of prostatic acid phosphatase was designed that is likely to function as a mechanism-based phosphotyrosine phosphatase inactivator. This molecule, 4-(fluoromethyl)phenyl phosphate, represents a useful paradigm for the design of potent and specific phosphatase inhibitors.