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1 Department of Molecular Pharmacology & Biological Chemistry, Northwestern University, Chicago, Illinois 60611-3008, USA
2 Department of Pharmacology, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, North Carolina 27599-7365, USA
Reprint requests to: Brian K. Shoichet, Department of Molecular Pharmacology & Biological Chemistry, Northwestern University, 303 E. Chicago Avenue, Chicago, IL 60611-3008, USA; e-mail: b-shoichet{at} northwestern.edu; fax: (312) 503-5349.
(RECEIVED December 18, 2000; FINAL REVISION March 2, 2001; ACCEPTED March 12, 2001)
Article and publication are at www.proteinscience.org/cgi/doi/10.1110/ps.52001.
| Abstract |
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HVH) of 193 kcal/mole. The binding of the ß-lactam antibiotics cefoxitin, cloxacillin, moxalactam, and imipenem all stabilized the enzyme significantly, with
Tm values as high as +4.6°C (a noncovalent interaction energy of +2.7 kcal/mole). Interestingly, the noncovalent interaction energies of these ligands did not correlate with their second-order acylation rate constants (k2/K'). These rate constants indicate the potency of a covalent inhibitor, but they appear to have little to do with interactions within covalent complexes, which is the state of the enzyme often used for structure-based inhibitor design. Keywords: Penicillin-binding protein; PBP 5; ß-lactam; ß-lactamase; enzyme stability; denaturation
Abbreviations: [125I]IPV, [125I]penicillin V
Cp, change in heat capacity at constant pressure
Ginteraction, noncovalent interaction energy
Gu, Gibbs free energy of unfolding
HVH, van't Hoff enthalpy of unfolding
Su, entropy of unfolding k2/K', second-order rate constant Keq, equilibrium constant PBP, penicillin-binding protein Tm, temperature of melting
| Introduction |
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Despite much interest in understanding the molecular interactions of ß-lactams with PBPs, their interaction energies have been difficult to determine. The noncovalent first encounter complex between the antibiotic and enzyme proceeds quickly to an acyl-enzyme adduct by attack of the catalytic serine hydroxyl on the carbonyl carbon of the ß-lactam ring (Fig. 1
). Because of this covalent bond formation and the resultant ß-lactam ring opening, ß-lactam antibiotics essentially bind irreversibly to PBPs, and there is no equilibrium between the free and covalently bound ligand. Hence, a thermodynamic interaction energy (
Ginteraction) cannot be determined for the covalent complex.
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HVH), and an entropy of denaturation (
Su). Because thermal denaturation does not break covalent bonds, the difference between the unfolding energy of the free enzyme and that of the covalent complex reflects the noncovalent interaction energy between the ligand and the enzyme in the covalent complex (
Ginteraction). Using a thermodynamic cycle (Fig. 2
Ginteraction +
Gcovalent +
Gu1 -
G3 -
Gcovalent -
Gu2 = 0. If we assume that the noncovalent interactions between the ligand and the denatured state are negligible (i.e.,
G3 = 0) and that the covalent energies between the enzyme and the ligand (
Gcovalent) are the same in the folded and unfolded states, then:
Ginteraction =
Gu2 -
Gu1 = 
Gu. Thus, the noncovalent interaction energy is equal to the net differential stability between the apo- and ligand-bound enzyme. This method closely resembles that used to determine stabilization energies of mutant enzymes, and it is reliable provided that the denaturation of both the apo- and bound enzyme is reversible, can be modeled as two-state, and the noncovalent energy of the denatured state is not significantly affected by the covalently bound ligand.
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| Results |
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HVH of 156 kcal/mole. Following denaturation, the sample was immediately cooled, and 100% of the folded CD signal returned. Moreover, cooling the denatured sample at a rate of 2°C/min, the same rate at which it had been denatured produced a renaturation curve that overlaid almost exactly the denaturation curve (data not shown). These data suggest that renaturation follows the same pathway as denaturation and that the folded and unfolded states are in thermodynamic equilibrium throughout the transition, a requirement for thermodynamic analysis.
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HVH of 193 kcal/mole (Fig. 3
HVH values of PBP 5 when monitored by fluorescence were essentially the same as those when monitored by far-UV CD. These data suggest that the values are independent of spectral technique, consistent with PBP 5 melting in a two-state fashion.
Denaturation of PBP ß-lactam adducts
To assess the complementarity of ß-lactams for PBP 5, covalent complexes were formed by incubation of PBP 5 with each of cefoxitin, cloxacillin, imipenem, or moxalactam. These complexes were then reversibly denatured by temperature, and the Tm and
HVH values were determined. Binding of each of these antibiotics increased the stability of PBP 5 (Fig. 4
; Table 1
); cloxacillin and imipenem stabilized PBP 5 to a greater extent than either cefoxitin or moxalactam. We note that the van't Hoff enthalpies of denaturation are often reduced in the ligand complexes. We suspect that this reflects the difficulty in fitting to the fluorescent denaturation curves, which are innately temperature dependent. However, a direct comparison of the free energies was also made by comparing the equilibria of unfolding at a reference temperature using the Gibbs-Helmholtz equation. By picking a temperature within the range of melting temperatures, namely 51.3°C, extrapolation errors are minimized. For these analyses, we used the van't Hoff enthalpies of each curve to determine equilibria. The two methods gave similar values for 
Gu (Table 1
). The free energies of stabilization reported are valid near the temperature of melting, but some caution is warranted when extrapolating these values to room temperature.
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Gu and k2/K' values was evident (Table 1| Discussion |
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Gu values, the order of complementarity of the ß-lactams for PBP 5 is: cloxacillin
imipenem > cefoxitin > moxalactam. Strikingly, cloxacillin, the ß-lactam that best complements PBP 5 in the acyl state, is the least potent inhibitor of PBP 5. Thus, ß-lactam antibiotics with greater complementarity to PBP 5 in the acylenzyme complex, as shown by more favorable interaction energies, are not better inhibitors of PBP 5. The discrepancy between the interaction energies and second-order rate constants becomes less troubling when one considers that these values are determined for different states of the enzyme and ligand. The second-order acylation rate constant (k2/K') measures the fit of the ligand to the active site in the precovalent complex multiplied by the rate of the chemical step. The noncovalent interaction energies measure the complementarity of a ß-lactam to a PBP in the acylated, postcovalent complex. Because acylated, ring-opened ß-lactam antibiotics bound to PBPs differ significantly from their precovalent, closed-ring forms (Kelly et al. 1989), and because there is no kinetic component to the noncovalent interaction energies measured by stability, the lack of correlation between the acylation rate constants and noncovalent interaction energies can be understood. An effective ß-lactam must complement the active site of its target sufficiently to allow rapid acylation, be chemically predisposed to the acylation reaction itself, and then deacylate very slowly. The rate of deacylation can depend on many factors, including steric blockage of hydrolytic attack (Patera et al. 2000). Once acylated, complementarity within the acylenzyme complex may play only a secondary role in determining how effective an inhibitor is. In this light, efforts to improve inhibitors by improving complementarity within covalent complexes may be misguided.
| Conclusions |
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| Materials and methods |
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Sample preparation
PBP 5 was diluted to a concentration of approximately 6 µg/mL in 3.5 mL of 50 mM potassium phosphate, 200 mM potassium chloride, 38% (v/v) ethylene glycol, pH 6.8. The buffer was prepared using ACS reagent grade potassium chloride from Sigma Chemical, potassium phosphate from Aldrich Chemical, spectroscopic grade ethylene glycol from Sigma, and doubly deionized water.
To form antibioticPBP 5 complexes, PBP 5 was incubated with a 50- to 100-fold molar excess of cloxacillin, moxalactam, cefoxitin (all from Sigma Chemical), or imipenem for periods of 5 min to 45 min. We note that some ß-lactam antibiotics took a longer incubation time to reach a constant, maximal Tm; we report the largest reproducible
Tm observed. An aliquot of the incubation mixture was then added to 3.5 mL of buffer solution, and the denaturation experiments were performed (see below). 
Gu values were determined by the method of Schellman for all complexes of enzyme with inhibitor (Becktel and Schellman 1987):
![]() | (1) |
where
![]() | (2) |
Because of the variations observed in the
HVH values of the thermal denaturations, we also compared the 
Gu values within the transition region directly using the Gibbs-Helmholtz equation:
![]() | (3) |
For each denaturation, the
G value was calculated using its thermodynamic parameters (Tm,
HVH,
S) as the reference values (T°,
H°,
S°) with T set to a temperature within the range of the observed Tm values, specifically at 51.3°C. 
Gu values were calculated as the difference between the
G value of each complex and the enzyme alone. Positive 
Gu values indicate increases in the Tm, hence stabilization; negative 
Gu values indicate decreases in the Tm, hence destabilization.
Thermal denaturation as monitored by CD and fluorescence
CD and fluorescence experiments were performed in a Jasco J-715 spectropolarimeter with a fluorescence emission attachment, which allows both spectra to be measured simultaneously. Temperature was controlled with a Jasco PTC-348WI peltier-effect temperature controller, using an in-cell probe to measure temperature. All solutions were stirred with a magnetic stirbar. Quartz cells with a 1-cm path length from Hellma (Jamaica, NY) were used for all experiments. The program EXAM (Kirchhoff 1993) was used to calculate all Tm and
HVH values. For these analyses, the change in heat capacity upon denaturation, (
Cp) was set to 6.0 kcal/molK, consistent with theoretical considerations (Myers et al. 1995); neither the Tm nor the
HVH values varied appreciably with
Cp values.
Samples were monitored for helical content by CD in the far-UV region at 223 nm, and for the tertiary structure by fluorescence emission following excitation at 285 nm. Thermal melting was performed at ramp rates of 2°C/min. Reversibility was judged using two criteria: the return of the original CD signal upon quick cooling and retracing of the path of the denaturation curve on slow cooling (at a ramp rate equal to that of unfolding, 2°C/min).
Acylation rate constant determination
Second-order rate constants for acylation (k2/K') of PBP 5 by ß-lactam antibiotics were determined from a time course of formation of the acylenzyme complex essentially as described (Frere et al. 1992), except k2/K' for [125I]IPV was determined by a time course for acylenzyme formation at a single concentration of [125I]IPV at 30°C (van der Linden et al. 1994). Briefly, PBP 5 (4.0 µg; 100 pmole) was diluted into 80 µL of 40 µM [125I]IPV in 50 mM TrisHCl, 500 mM NaCl, 10% glycerol. At 15-sec intervals up to 1 min (and 2-min intervals after that), 10-µL aliquots were removed and added to 5 µL 3x SDS-PAGE sample buffer. The samples were submitted to electrophoresis on a 10% polyacrylamide gel, and the levels of [125I]IPVPBP 5 complex were quantitated with ImageQuant software following phosphoimager analysis on a Storm 840 Phosphoimager (Molecular Dynamics, Sunnyvale, CA). The k2/K'; value was calculated by dividing the apparent first-order rate constant derived from the time course by the concentration of [125I]IPV.
The second-order rate constants (k2/K') for cefoxitin, imipenem, cloxacillin, and moxalactam were determined by the competition method. Variable concentrations of the unlabeled antibiotic were mixed with a fixed concentration of [125I]IPV (40 µM), followed by addition of PBP 5 (0.25 µg; 6.3 pmole), and the mixture was incubated at 30°C for 10 min. The level of radioactivity bound to the proteins was quantitated as described above. k2/K' constants were calculated using the equation:
![]() | (4) |
where ECo and ECL represent the ([125I]IPVPBP 5) formed in the absence and presence of the unlabeled antibiotic, respectively, and CU and CL represent the concentrations of the unlabeled and labeled antibiotic, respectively (Frere et al. 1992).
| Acknowledgments |
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The publication costs of this article were defrayed in part by payment of page charges. This article must therefore be hereby marked "advertisement" in accordance with 18 USC section 1734 solely to indicate this fact.
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