Zinc-regulated ubiquitin conjugation signals endocytosis of the yeast ZRT1 zinc transporter.

The yeast ZRT1 zinc transporter is regulated by zinc at both transcriptional and post-translational levels. At the post-translational level, zinc inactivates ZRT1 by inducing the removal of the protein from the plasma membrane by endocytosis. The zinc transporter is subsequently degraded in the vacuole. This regulatory system allows for the rapid shut off of zinc uptake activity in cells exposed to high zinc concentrations, thereby preventing overaccumulation of this potentially toxic metal. In this report, we examine the role of ubiquitin conjugation in this process. First, we show that ZRT1 is ubiquitinated shortly after zinc treatment and before endocytosis. Secondly, mutations in various components of the ubiquitin conjugation pathway, specifically the RSP5 ubiquitin-protein ligase and the UBC4 and UBC5 ubiquitin conjugating enzymes, inhibit both ubiquitination and endocytosis. Finally, mutation of a specific lysine residue in ZRT1 blocks both ubiquitination and endocytosis. This critical lysine, Lys-195, is located in a cytoplasmic loop region of the protein and may be the residue to which ubiquitin is attached. These results demonstrate that ubiquitin conjugation is a critical step in the signal transduction pathway that controls the rate of ZRT1 endocytosis in response to zinc.

Zinc-induced inactivation of the yeast ZRT1 zinc transporter occurs through endocytosis and vacuolar degradation.

The ZRT1 gene encodes the transporter responsible for high affinity zinc uptake in yeast. ZRT1 is transcribed in zinc-limited cells and its transcription is repressed in zinc-replete cells. In this report, we describe a second, post-translational mechanism that regulates ZRT1 activity. In zinc-limited cells, ZRT1 is a stable, N-glycosylated plasma membrane protein. Exposure to high levels of extracellular zinc triggers a rapid loss of ZRT1 uptake activity. Our results demonstrate that this inactivation occurs through zinc-induced endocytosis of the protein and its subsequent degradation in the vacuole. Mutations that inhibit the internalization step of endocytosis also inhibited zinc-induced ZRT1 inactivation and the major vacuolar proteases were required to degrade ZRT1 in response to zinc. Furthermore, immunofluorescence microscopy showed that ZRT1 is localized to the plasma membrane in zinc-limited cells and that the protein is transferred to the vacuole via an endosome-like compartment upon exposure to zinc. ZRT1 inactivation is a relatively specific response to zinc; cadmium and cobalt ions trigger the response but less effectively than zinc. Moreover, zinc does not alter the stability of several other plasma membrane proteins. Therefore, zinc-induced ZRT1 inactivation is a specific regulatory system to shut off zinc uptake activity in cells exposed to high extracellular zinc levels thereby preventing overaccumulation of this potentially toxic metal.