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Hoffmann, R. A wiki for the life sciences where authorship matters. Nature Genetics (2008)
 
 
 
 
 

Cysteine protease characteristics of the proteoglycanase activity from normal and pseudoxanthoma elasticum (PXE) fibroblasts.

Pseudoxanthoma elasticum (PXE) is an inherited disease characterized by calcified degenerative changes of elastin in the skin, eye, and vasculature. Previous studies suggested the abnormal presence of a protease from PXE fibroblasts that degrades sulfated proteoglycans. This study describes the use of a radioassay to quantitate proteoglycan degradation by proteases from normal and PXE fibroblasts. PXE protease had optimal activity at pH 6. 0. Inhibition of activity by 5 mM diisopropylfluorophosphate, 5 mM phenylmethylsulfonylfluoride, and 0.1 mM HgCl2 was reversed by 10 mM dithiothreitol. Iodoacetamide (1 mM) irreversibly inhibited activity. Carbobenzyloxy-phenylalanyl-alanyl (0.1 mM) and carbobenzyloxy-lysyl-diazomethyl ketone (10 microM) inhibited the proteoglycanase activity. These data suggest that the PXE proteolytic proteoglycanase activity is a cysteine protease. After blocking activity with 5 mM EDTA, addition of 10 mM Mg++, Mn++, Cu++, or Co++ had little effect (less than 10%) on restoring activity, 10 mM CaCl2 restored approximately 70% recovery of the activity, and 10 mM ZnCl2 stimulated the activity to 500% of the initial level. Similar normal fibroblast samples contained little zinc-dependent activity and a substantial amount of calcium-dependent activity. Thus the distinction between the divalent ion requirements for proteoglycan degradation suggests that the PXE fibroblasts may produce a different cysteine protease than do normal fibroblasts.[1]

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