A carbohydrate-binding family 48 module enables feruloyl esterase action on polymeric arabinoxylan

Jesper Brask,Ditte H Welner,Folmer Fredslund,Casper Wilkens,Kristian B.R.M Krogh,Jesper Holck,Marie S Møller,Lene Lange,Anne S Meyer,Birte Svensson

doi:10.1074/jbc.ra119.009523

Abstract

Feruloyl esterases (EC 3.1.1.73), belonging to carbohydrate esterase family 1 (CE1), hydrolyze ester bonds between ferulic acid (FA) and arabinose moieties in arabinoxylans. Recently, some CE1 enzymes identified in metagenomics studies have been predicted to contain a family 48 carbohydrate-binding module (CBM48), a CBM family associated with starch binding. Two of these CE1s, wastewater treatment sludge (wts) Fae1A and wtsFae1B isolated from wastewater treatment surplus sludge, have a cognate CBM48 domain and are feruloyl esterases, and wtsFae1A binds arabinoxylan. Here, we show that wtsFae1B also binds to arabinoxylan and that neither binds starch. Surface plasmon resonance analysis revealed that wtsFae1B's Kd for xylohexaose is 14.8 μm and that it does not bind to starch mimics, β-cyclodextrin, or maltohexaose. Interestingly, in the absence of CBM48 domains, the CE1 regions from wtsFae1A and wtsFae1B did not bind arabinoxylan and were also unable to catalyze FA release from arabinoxylan. Pretreatment with a β-d-1,4-xylanase did enable CE1 domain-mediated FA release from arabinoxylan in the absence of CBM48, indicating that CBM48 is essential for the CE1 activity on the polysaccharide. Crystal structures of wtsFae1A (at 1.63 Å resolution) and wtsFae1B (1.98 Å) revealed that both are folded proteins comprising structurally-conserved hydrogen bonds that lock the CBM48 position relative to that of the CE1 domain. wtsFae1A docking indicated that both enzymes accommodate the arabinoxylan backbone in a cleft at the CE1-CBM48 domain interface. Binding at this cleft appears to enable CE1 activities on polymeric arabinoxylan, illustrating an unexpected and crucial role of CBM48 domains for accommodating arabinoxylan.

Highlights

Feruloyl esterases (EC 3.1.1.73), belonging to carbohydrate esterase family 1 (CE1), hydrolyze ester bonds between ferulic acid (FA) and arabinose moieties in arabinoxylans
Both wtsFae1A and wtsFae1B were identified in a metagenomic study of an anaerobic digester fed with surplus wastewater treatment sludge [19]. wtsFae1A is the N-terminal part of a chimeric enzyme we previously studied; the larger chimeric, or triple, enzyme, in addition to the terminal wtsFae1A, has a glycoside hydrolase family 62 ␣-L-arabinofuranosidase (EC 3.2.1.55) and a glycoside hydrolase family 10 ␤-1,4-D-xylanase (EC 3.2.1.8) [22]. wtsFae1A and wtsFae1B are 343 and 386 amino acids in length, including 28 and 24 predicted signal peptide residues, respectively
Enzymes that often differ from previously characterized enzymes in domain organization or differ sufficiently at the sequence level suggest that these enzymes are capable of acting on substrates not previously seen within specific enzyme families [31]