For more than half a century, transition state theory has provided a useful framework for understanding the origins of enzyme catalysis. As proposed by Pauling, enzymes accelerate chemical reactions by binding transition states tighter than substrates, thereby lowering the activation energy compared with that of the corresponding uncatalyzed process. This paradigm has been challenged for chorismate mutase (CM), a well-characterized metabolic enzyme that catalyzes the rearrangement of chorismate to prephenate. Calculations have predicted the decisive factor in CM catalysis to be ground state destabilization rather than transition state stabilization. Using X-ray crystallography, we show, in contrast, that a sluggish variant of Bacillus subtilis CM, in which a cationic active-site arginine was replaced by a neutral citrulline, is a poor catalyst even though it effectively preorganizes chorismate for the reaction. A series of high-resolution molecular snapshots of the reaction coordinate, including the apo enzyme, and complexes with substrate, transition state analog and product, demonstrate that an active site, which is only complementary in shape to a reactive substrate conformer, is insufficient for effective catalysis. Instead, as with other enzymes, electrostatic stabilization of the CM transition state appears to be crucial for achieving high reaction rates.

The natural amino acids histidine and glutamic acid were immobilized on the surface of functionalized mesoporous silica supports. Histidine and glutamic acid alone and combinations of both were covalently bound to the amino groups on the surface of the support by the formation of amide bonds. The immobilized amino acids were used as ligands for Fe(II). The obtained biomimetic iron complexes were tested as catalysts for cyclohexane oxidation at mild reaction conditions with hydrogenperoxide as oxidant. This stepwise preparation method allowed the synthesis of materials with varying nature and loading of immobilized amino acids. The observed trends in catalytic activity show that both the type and the surface density of immobilized amino acid have an influence on the catalytic performance during cyclohexane oxidation and also on the structure of the immobilized Fe complex.

The structural and dynamical consequences of ligand binding to a monofunctional chorismate mutase from Bacillus subtilis have been investigated by solution NMR spectroscopy. TROSY methods were employed to assign 98% of the backbone (1)H(N), (1)H(alpha), (15)N, (13)C', and (13)C(alpha) resonances as well as 86% of the side chain (13)C resonances of the 44 kDa trimeric enzyme at 20 degrees C. This information was used to map chemical shift perturbations and changes in intramolecular mobility caused by binding of prephenate or a transition state analogue to the X-ray structure. Model-free interpretation of backbone dynamics for the free enzyme and its complexes based on (15)N relaxation data measured at 600 and 900 MHz showed significant structural consolidation of the protein in the presence of a bound ligand. In agreement with earlier structural and biochemical studies, substantial ordering of 10 otherwise highly flexible residues at the C-terminus is particularly notable. The observed changes suggest direct contact between this protein segment and the bound ligand, providing support for the proposal that the C-terminus can serve as a lid for the active site, limiting diffusion into and out of the pocket and possibly imposing conformational control over substrate once bound. Other regions of the protein that experience substantial ligand-induced changes also border the active site or lie along the subunit interfaces, indicating that the enzyme adapts dynamically to ligands by a sort of induced fit mechanism. It is believed that the mutase-catalyzed chorismate-to-prephenate rearrangement is partially encounter controlled, and backbone motions on the millisecond time scale, as seen here, may contribute to the reaction barrier.

Citrulline was incorporated via chemical semisynthesis at position 90 in the active site of the AroH chorismate mutase from Bacillus subtilis. The wild-type arginine at this position makes hydrogen-bonding interactions with the ether oxygen of chorismate. Replacement of the positively charged guanidinium group with the isosteric but neutral urea has a dramatic effect on the ability of the enzyme to convert chorismate into prephenate. The Arg90Cit variant exhibits a >104-fold decrease in the catalytic rate constant kcat with a 2.7-fold increase in the Michaelis constant Km. In contrast, its affinity for a conformationally constrained inhibitor molecule that effectively mimics the geometry but not the dissociative character of the transition state is only reduced by a factor of approximately 6. These results show that an active site merely complementary to the reactive conformation of chorismate is insufficient for catalysis of the mutase reaction. Instead, electrostatic stabilization of the polarized transition state by provision of a cationic hydrogen bond donor proximal to the oxygen in the breaking C-O bond is essential for high catalytic efficiency.

Electrospray time-of-flight mass spectrometry was used to quantitatively determine the dissociation constant of chorismate mutase and a transition state analogue inhibitor. This system presents a fairly complex stoichiometry because the native protein is a homotrimer with three equal and independent substrate binding sites. We can detect the chorismate mutase trimer as well as chorismate mutase-inhibitor complexes by choosing appropriate conditions in the ESI source. To verify that the protein-inhibitor complexes are specific, titration experiments with different enzyme variants and different inhibitors were performed. A plot of the number of bound inhibitors versus added inhibitor concentration revealed saturation behavior with 3:1 (inhibitor:functional trimer) stoichiometry for the TSA. The soft ESI conditions, the relatively high protein mass of 43.5 kDa, and the low charge state (high m/z) result in broad peaks, a typical problem in analyzing noncovalent protein complexes. Due to the low molecular weight of the TSA (226 Da) the peaks of the free protein and the protein with one, two or three inhibitors bound cannot be clearly resolved. For data analysis, relative peak areas of the deconvoluted spectra of chorismate mutase-inhibitor complexes were obtained by fitting appropriate peak shapes to the signals corresponding to the free enzyme and its complexes with one, two, or three inhibitor molecules. From the relative peak areas we were able to calculate a dissociation constant that agreed well with known solution-phase data. This method may be generally useful for interpreting mass spectra of noncovalent complexes that exhibit broad peaks in the high m/z range.

A hydrogen bond between the amide backbone of Arg7 and the remote imidazole side chain of His106 has been directly observed by improved TROSY-NMR techniques in the 44 kDa trimeric enzyme chorismate mutase from Bacillus subtilis. The presence of this hydrogen bond in the free enzyme and its complexes with a transition state analog and the reaction product was demonstrated by measurement of 15N-15N and 1H-15N trans-hydrogen bond scalar couplings, 2hJNN and 1hJHN, and by transfer of nuclear polarization across the hydrogen bond. The conformational dependences of these coupling constants were analyzed using sum-over-states density functional perturbation theory (SOS-DFPT). The observed hydrogen bond might stabilize the scaffold at the active site of BsCM. Because the Arg7-His106 hydrogen bond has not been observed in any of the high resolution crystal structures of BsCM, the measured coupling constants provide unique information about the enzyme and its complexes that should prove useful for structural refinement of atomic models.

TROSY-type optimization of liquid-state NMR experiments is based on the preservation of unique coherence transfer pathways with distinct transverse relaxation properties. The broadband decoupling of the 1H spins interchanges the TROSY and anti-TROSY magnetization transfer pathways and thus is not used in TROSY-type triple resonance experiments or is replaced with narrowband selective decoupling. To achieve the full advantage of TROSY, the uniform deuteration of proteins is usually required. Here we propose a new and general method for 1H broadband decoupling in TROSY NMR, which does not compromise the relaxation optimization in the 15N–1H moieties, but uniformly and efficiently refocuses the 1JCH scalar coupling evolution in the 13C–1H moieties. Combined with the conventional 2H decoupling, this method enables obtaining high sensitivity TROSY-type triple resonance spectra with partially deuterated or fully protonated 13C,15N labeled proteins.