Search

Human type 10 17beta-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase (HSD) is a homotetrameric protein located in mitochondria. This enzyme was alternatively named short chain L-3-hydroxyacyl-CoA dehydrogenase (SCHSD). This NAD(H)-dependent dehydrogenase is essential for the metabolism of branched-chain fatty acids and isoleucine, and is expressed in a variety of tissues, e.g., prostate, brain, liver, and heart. This enzyme inactivates 17beta-estradiol and exhibits a strong oxidative 3alpha-HSD activity to convert 5alpha-androstanediol and allopregnanolone into 5alpha-dihydrotestosterone (5alpha-DHT) and 5alpha-dihydroprogesterone, respectively, in living cells. Certain malignant prostatic epithelial cells and activated astrocytes in Alzheimer's disease patient's brain contain extraordinarily high levels of this enzyme. This mitochondrial dehydrogenase enables prostate cancer cells to generate 5alpha-DHT in the absence of testosterone. Its inactivation of allopregnanolone is important to the modulation of GABA(A) receptor. Among steroidogenic enzymes 17beta-HSD10 plays a significant part in the intracrinology. Although this protein has an affinity for amyloid-beta peptide, its role in the pathogenesis of Alzheimer's disease is far from clear. Additional knowledge of this versatile enzyme would provide the foundation for designing new drugs aimed at treating some neurological diseases and certain types of cancers.

Glu139 of the large alpha-subunit of the multienzyme complex of fatty acid oxidation from Escherichia coli was identified as the catalytic residue of enoyl-CoA hydratase [Yang, S.-Y., He, X.-Y., & Schulz, H. (1995) Biochemistry 34, 6441-6447]. To determine whether any of the other conserved protic residues is directly involved in the hydratase catalysis, the multienzyme complexes with either an alpha/Asp69 --> Asn or an alpha/Glu119 --> Gln mutation were overproduced and characterized. The catalytic properties of 3-ketoacyl-CoA thiolase and l-3-hydroxyacyl-CoA dehydrogenase of the mutant complexes were almost unaffected. The amidation of Asp69 and Glu119 caused a 7.6- and 88-fold decrease, respectively, in the kcat of enoyl-CoA hydratase without a significant change in the Km value of the hydratase as well as a 5.9- and 62-fold increase, respectively, in the Km of Delta3-cis-Delta2-trans-enoyl-CoA isomerase with a very small decrease in the kcat of the latter enzyme. The data suggest that the carboxyl group of Glu119 is particularly important to the catalytic activity of enoyl-CoA hydratase. Furthermore, the wild-type hydratase shows a bell-shaped pH dependence of the kcat/Km with pKa values of 5.9 and 9.2, whereas the Glu119 --> Gln mutant hydratase has only a single pKa of 9.5. A simple explanation for these observations is that a deprotonated Glu119 and a protonated Glu139 are required for the high kcat of the enoyl-CoA hydratase. The results of site-directed mutagenesis studies, together with the structural information about the spatial arrangement of two conserved glutamate residues of rat liver enoyl-CoA hydratase [Engel, C. K., Mathieu, M., Zeelen, J. P., Hiltunen, J. K., and Wierenga, R. K. (1996) EMBO J. 15, 5135-5145] to which Glu119 and Glu139 of the large alpha-subunit correspond, lead to the conclusion that the gamma-carboxyl group of Glu119 serves as the second general acid-base functional group in catalyzing the hydration of 2-trans-enoyl-CoA.

The amino-terminal and internal sequences of the isolated large subunit of trifunctional beta-oxidation complex from pig heart mitochondria were determined by Edman degradation. The results demonstrated that the sequence of this novel beta-oxidation enzyme is identical with the sequence recently reported for a porcine gastrin binding protein that serves as the gastrin receptor on parietal cell surfaces. Evidence is provided to show that it is unlikely that the porcine gastrin binding protein has such a sequence. The data lead us to conclude that the mature large subunit of porcine trifunctional beta-oxidation complex is composed of 727 amino acid residues with a calculated molecular weight of 79,113, while the precursor of this long-chain fatty acid oxidation enzyme has a mitochondrial presequence consisting of 36 residues and a calculated M(r) of 83,099.

The kinetics of bovine liver enoyl-CoA hydratase (EC 4.2.1.17) or crotonase with 2-trans-hexadecenoyl-CoA as a substrate were studied because different rates were obtained with two assay methods based on measurements of substrate utilization and product formation, respectively. L-3-Hydroxyhexadecanoyl-CoA, the product of the crotonase-catalyzed hydration of 2-trans-hexadecenoyl-CoA, was found to be a strong competitive inhibitor of the enzyme with a Ki of 0.35 microM. In contrast the short-chain product, L-3-hydroxybutyryl-CoA, is a weak competitive inhibitor with a Ki of 37 microM. L-3-Hydroxyhexadecanoyl-CoA is a much stronger inhibitor of crotonase than are other short-chain and long-chain intermediates of beta-oxidation and crotonase is more severely inhibited by this compound than are all beta-oxidation enzymes tested so far. Determination of true kinetic parameters for the crotonase-catalyzed hydration of long-chain substrates requires the removal of product in a coupled assay. When this was done, the Km for 2-trans-hexadecenoyl-CoA with bovine liver crotonase was found to be only 9 microM. It is suggested that under conditions of restricted beta-oxidation, when 3-hydroxyacyl-CoAs accumulate in mitochondria, the inhibition of crotonase by long-chain 3-hydroxyacyl-CoAs may limit the further degradation of medium-chain and short-chain intermediates of beta-oxidation.

In an attempt to clarify why the brain oxidizes fatty acids poorly or not at all, the activities of beta-oxidation enzymes present in rat brain and rat heart mitochondria were measured and compared with each other. Although the apparent Km values and chain-length specificities of the brain and heart enzymes are similar, the specific activities of all but one brain enzyme are between 4 and 50% of those observed in heart mitochondria. The exception is 3-ketoacyl-CoA thiolase (EC 2.3.1.16) whose specific activity in brain mitochondria is 125 times lower than in heart mitochondria. The partially purified brain 3-ketoacyl-CoA thiolase was shown to be catalytically and immunologically identical with the heart enzyme. The low rate of fatty acid oxidation in brain mitochondria, estimated on the basis of palmitoylcarnitine-supported respiration and [1-14C]palmitoylcarnitine degradation to be less than 0.5 nmol/min/mg of protein, may be the consequence of the low activity of 3-ketoacyl-CoA thiolase. Inhibition of [1-14C]palmitoylcarnitine oxidation by 4-bromocrotonic acid proves the observed oxidation of fatty acids in brain to be dependent on 3-ketoacyl-CoA thiolase and thus to occur via beta-oxidation. Since the reactions catalyzed by carnitine palmitoyltransferase (EC 2.3.1.21) and acyl-CoA synthetase (EC 6.2.1.3) do not seem to restrict fatty acid oxidation in brain, it is concluded that the oxidation of fatty acids in rat brain is limited by the activity of the mitochondrial 3-keto-acyl-CoA thiolase.