1 research outputs found
Unraveling the Phosphocholination Mechanism of the <i>Legionella pneumophila</i> Enzyme AnkX
The
intracellular pathogen <i>Legionella pneumophila</i> infects
lung macrophages and injects numerous effector proteins
into the host cell to establish a vacuole for proliferation. The necessary
interference with vesicular trafficking of the host is achieved by
modulation of the function of Rab GTPases. The effector protein AnkX
chemically modifies Rab1b and Rab35 by covalent phosphocholination
of serine or threonine residues using CDP-choline as a donor. So far,
the phosphoryl transfer mechanism and the relevance of observed autophosphocholination
of AnkX remained disputable. We designed tailored caged compounds
to make this type of enzymatic reaction accessible for time-resolved
Fourier transform infrared difference spectroscopy. By combining spectroscopic
and biochemical methods, we determined that full length AnkX is autophosphocholinated
at Ser521, Thr620, and Thr943. However, autophosphocholination loses
specificity for these sites in shortened constructs and does not appear
to be relevant for the catalysis of the phosphoryl transfer. In contrast,
transient phosphocholination of His229 in the conserved catalytic
motif might exist as a short-lived reaction intermediate. Upon substrate
binding, His229 is deprotonated and locked in this state, being rendered
capable of a nucleophilic attack on the pyrophosphate moiety of the
substrate. The proton that originated from His229 is transferred to
a nearby carboxylic acid residue. Thus, our combined findings support
a ping-pong mechanism involving phosphocholination of His229 and subsequent
transfer of phosphocholine to the Rab GTPase. Our approach can be
extended to the investigation of further nucleotidyl transfer reactions,
which are currently of reemerging interest in regulatory pathways
of host–pathogen interactions