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We previously found a trypsin-like proteinase which momentarily appears immediately before DNA synthesis in the cell cycle of Escherichia coli synchronized by phosphate starvation and which is closely related to the initiation of DNA replication (Kato, M., Irisawa, T., Morimoto, Y. and Muramatu, M., unpublished results). The proteinase was named proteinase In. It was purified approximately 2880-fold with a recovery of 15%. The isolated enzyme appeared homogeneous by gel filtration and electrophoresis. Its molecular mass was estimated by analytical gel filtration and SDS/PAGE as approximately 66 kDa. The isoelectric point of proteinase In is 4.9 and its optimal pH is approximately 9. Although protein In hydrolyzes fluorogenic substrate for trypsin, its hydrolytic activity seems markedly affected by amino-acid sequence lying towards the N-terminal from the P1 (lysine, arginine) residue. The proteinase does not hydrolyze N2-benzoyl-D,L-arginine-4-nitronanilide and fluorogenic substrates for chymotrypsin and elastase. The proteinase activity is inhibited by leupeptin, antipain and 4-nitrophenyl 4-guanidinobenzoate, but the effects of tosyl-L-lysine chloromethane, diisopropylfluorophosphate, benzamidine and pentamidine isethionate on the proteinase activity are weak or not inhibitory. Its activity is strongly affected in the presence of NaCl and KCl, and at a concentration of 1.5 M, these increase the activity 14-fold and 13-fold, respectively, above that without salt. Proteinase In was strongly inhibited by various esters of trans-4-guanidinome-thylcyclohexanecarboxylic acid, and their inhibitory effects were roughly correlated with those on growth of E. coli. Proteinase activity was found in the cytoplasmic fraction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]