Biochemical discrimination between selenium and sulfur 2: mechanistic investigation of the selenium specificity of human selenocysteine lyase.

ABSTRACT: Selenium is an essential trace element incorporated into selenoproteins as selenocysteine. Selenocysteine (Sec) lyases (SCLs) and cysteine (Cys) desulfurases (CDs) catalyze the removal of selenium or sulfur from Sec or Cys, respectively, and generally accept both substrates. Intriguingly, human SCL (hSCL) is specific for Sec even though the only difference between Sec and Cys is a single chalcogen atom.The crystal structure of hSCL was recently determined and gain-of-function protein variants that also could accept Cys as substrate were identified. To obtain mechanistic insight into the chemical basis for its substrate discrimination, we here report time-resolved spectroscopic studies comparing the reactions of the Sec-specific wild-type hSCL and the gain-of-function D146K/H389T variant, w

SUBMITTER: Johansson AL 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3266904 | biostudies-literature | 2012

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature