Residue accessibility, hydrogen bonding, and molecular recognition: Metal-chelate probing of active site histidines in chymotrypsins

Subspecies defining the maturation pathway of bovine chymotrypsinogen to alpha-chymotrypsin have been separated in a single chromatographic run by affinity to iminodiacetic acid-Cu(II) [IDA-Cu(II)] immobilized onto Novarose. A major highlight of the elution pattern is that, as maturation proceeds, these subspecies exhibit a correlated increase in affinity toward IDA-Cu(II). This behavior is analyzed by a combination of physicochemical and molecular modeling techniques to assess the contribution of the two histidines present in chymotrypsins, at positions 40 and 57 on the protein surface. Catalytic His-57 features adequate surface accessibility to serve as a ligand to IDA-Cu(II), but its participation is clearly ruled out by specific chemical modification. In contrast, His-40, whose side chain is buried in the crystal structures of both zymogen and mature enzyme, surprisingly proves the most plausible candidate as an electron donor to IDA-Cu(II). This apparent conflict between histidine accessibility and their implication in IDA-Cu(II) recognition has been rationalized on the basis of their flexibility and/or hydrogen-bonding status, with the following outcome. First, histidine constitutes a useful reporter group for subtle protein conformational fluctuations. Second, static accessibility computation alone provides no unequivocal guideline as to whether a protein residue can serve as a ligand. Third, this study is the first to document the occurrence of a screening effect due to hydrogen bonding of an otherwise "accessible" histidine. A significant corollary to this finding would be that the catalytic histidine is rigidly entrapped in a remarkably strong hydrogen-bonding network, a situation that may pertain to mechanistic aspects of catalysis.