Participation of Carbohydrate Structures in the Formation of Complex Structure of Hemocyanins from Haliotis tuberculata

Abstract

Glycosylation plays an important role in many important processes in organisms. Their participation in the construction of the tertiary structure and immunotherapeutic activity of the hemocyanin Rapana venosa (RvH) from the Black Sea has been presented. Based on these results, the importance of glycans in organization of the structure of hemocyanin from the abdominal mollusk Haliotis tuberculata (HtH) was also studied.
 After incubation of both isoforms HtH1 and HtH2 with yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae and enzyme Zymolyase, fractions with lower molecular weight (MW) between 45 and 65 kDa, which corresponds to MW of functional units (FUs) of hemocyanins, was identified. A comparative analysis of 10% SDS PAGE assays confirmed the depolymerization of the subunits HtH1 and HtH2 due to the specific glycosidase in the yeast S. cerevisiae and the enzyme Zymolyase. The presented results confirm our hypothesis that glycans are involved in the formation of the structural subunits of HtH.