Immunohistochemical analysis of human skeletal muscle AMP deaminase deficiency. Evidence of a correlation between the muscle HPRG content and the level of the residual AMP deaminase activity

We have previously described that, in healthy human skeletal muscle, an anti-histidine-proline-rich-glycoprotein (HPRG) antibody selectively binds to type IIB fibers that are well known to contain the highest level of AMP deaminase (AMPD) activity, suggesting an association of the HPRG-like protein to the enzyme isoform M. The present paper reports an immunohistochemical study performed on human skeletal muscle biopsies from patients with AMPD deficiency and carried out utilizing both the anti-HPRG antibody and an anti-AMPD antibody specific for the isoform M. A correlation between the muscle content of the HPRG-like protein and the level of AMPD activity was demonstrated. In the specimens from patients with Acquired AMPD deficiency the HPRG-immunoreactivity was less intense than that shown by the control subjects and was related to the residual AMPD activity. The patients affected by Primary and Coincidental AMPD deficiency, which were characterized by an absence of enzyme activity and AMPD immunoreactivity, showed the lowest HPRG immunoreactivity that was clearly detectable by Western blot analysis, but not by immunohistochemistry. The interpretation of the significance of these observations suggests a physiological mutual dependence between skeletal muscle HPRG and AMPD polypeptides with regard to their stability

Role of troponin T and AMP deaminase in the modulation of skeletal muscle contraction

In fast muscle, isoforms of troponin T (TnT) contain an N-terminal hypervariable region that does not bind any protein of the thin filament. The N-terminal domain of TnT is removed by calpain during stress conditions and so could modulate the role of TnT in the regulation of contraction by affecting the TnT-binding affinity for tropomyosin (Tm) depending on the sequence and charge within the domain. During skeletal muscle contraction, the myokinase reaction is displaced by AMP deaminase (AMPD), an allosteric metalloenzyme, toward the formation of ATP. An unrestrained AMPD activity follows the proteolytic cleavage of the enzyme in vivo that releases a 97 aa N-terminal fragment, removing the inhibition exerted by the binding of ATP to a zinc site in the N-terminal region. Rabbit fast TnT or its phosphorylated 50-aa residue N-terminal peptide restores in AMPD the inhibition by ATP, removed in vitro by the release of a 95 aa N-terminal fragment by trypsin. Since the N-terminal region of fast rabbit TnT contains a putative zinc-binding motif, it can be inferred that TnT mimics the regulatory action exerted in native AMPD by the N-terminal domain that holds the enzyme in a less active conformation due to the presence of a zinc ion connecting the N-terminal and C-terminal regions. Together with evidence that AMPD is localized on the myofibril, the data reported in this review on the interactions between AMPD and TnT strongly suggest that these proteins mutually combine to fine-tune the regulation of muscle contraction in fast muscle