Effect of pH Dependent Substrate Inhibition on Glutamate Dehydrogenase Kinetics

Abstract

Glutamate dehydrogenase (GDH) serves as the main regulated enzyme linking protein and carbohydrate metabolism. This enzyme converts the amino acid glutamate to the TCA intermediate, α‐ketoglutarate. While dysregulation of GDH is linked to hyperinsulinism and other diseases, the kinetics this enzyme of have only been analyzed under dilution conditions. However, cells are more crowded than these buffer solutions frequently used to collect enzyme kinetics data because their cytoplasm contains high concentrations of proteins, carbohydrates, and other macromolecules. Evidence has shown that this macromolecular crowding slow diffusion rates and changes protein conformations, which alters the kinetics of enzymes. Scientists often mimic the crowded environment of a cell using large, synthetic polymers, such as dextran, a glucose polymer, which excludes volume to other biological molecules in the same solution. While several studies have characterized these excluded volume effects on enzyme kinetics, this is the first study to analyze the effects of crowding on enzyme inhibition. Investigating how inhibitors like GTP and activators like leucine effect the kinetics of GDH will provide a deeper understanding of the regulation of this enzyme inside out bodies. Furthermore, saturating amounts of glutamate results in substrate inhibition of GDH by forming a “dead end complex” comprised of glutamate, NADH, and GDH at low pH values. To understand the effects of crowding on substrate inhibition, GDH Michaelis Menten kinetics were analyzed in the presence and absence of dextran at four pH values. These assays were repeated with glucose, the monomer of dextran as a control to separate chemical effects from excluded volume effects caused by the large size of dextran. The presence of dextran resulted in more substrate inhibition than in the presence of glucose and this inhibition that was observed at higher pH values than in buffer alone. Leucine, a known activator of GDH, operates by destabilizing the dead‐end complex. While the presence of leucine decreases substrate inhibition in dilute conditions, this compound was unable to active GDH in the presence of dextran. Overall, these results suggest that crowding promotes substrate inhibition by stabilizing the dead‐end complex of GDH which is a stronger interaction than leucine dissociation of the dead‐end complex. Therefore, macromolecular crowding in a cell could provide an additional level of regulation on GDH inside cells.