Abstract
This paper provides evidence to demonstrate that human prothrombin undergoes conformational changes upon binding to procoagulant membranes specifically containing phosphatidylserine (PS). Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy was used to show a slight increase in ordered (alpha-helix, beta-sheet, beta-turns) secondary structure upon binding to PS-containing membranes. Thermograms representing prothrombin and prothrombin fragment 1 denaturation were obtained using differential scanning calorimetry. These were analyzed and interpreted in terms of changes in prothrombin domain organization associated with binding to PS-containing membranes. Changes in either secondary structure or domain organization upon binding to negatively-charged phosphatidylglycerol-containing membranes were, if they occurred at all, much less dramatic. The results paralleled results obtained previously with bovine prothrombin (1, 2). The implications of these results in terms of a possible molecular mechanism for the cofactor-like role of platelet membrane vesicles in prothrombin activation are discussed.
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