We repor
t a mul
tiface
ted s
tudy of
the ac
tive si
te region of human pancrea
tic
-amylase. Througha series of novel kine
tic analyses using mal
to-oligosaccharides and mal
to-oligosaccharyl fluorides, anoverall cleavage ac
tion pa
ttern for
this enzyme has been developed. The preferred binding/cleavage modeoccurs when a mal
tose residue serves as
the leaving group (aglycone si
tes +1 and +2) and
there are
threesugars in
the glycon (-1, -2, -3) si
tes. Overall i
t appears
tha
t five binding subsi
tes span
the ac
tive si
te,al
though an addi
tional glycon subsi
te appears
to be a significan
t fac
tor in
the binding of longer subs
tra
tes.Kine
tic parame
ters for
the cleavage of subs
tra
tes modified a
t the 2 and 4' ' posi
tions also highligh
t theimpor
tance of
these hydroxyl groups for ca
talysis and iden
tify
the ra
te-de
termining s
tep. Fur
ther kine
ticand s
truc
tural s
tudies pinpoin
t Asp197 as being
the likely nucleophile in ca
talysis, wi
th subs
ti
tu
tion of
this residue leading
to an ~10
6-fold drop in ca
taly
tic ac
tivi
ty. S
truc
tural s
tudies show
tha
t the originalpseudo-
te
trasaccharide s
truc
ture of acarbose is modified upon binding, presumably
through a series ofhydrolysis and
transglycosyla
tion reac
tions. The end resul
t is a pseudo-pen
tasaccharide moie
ty
tha
t spans
the ac
tive si
te region wi
th i
ts N-linked "glycosidic" bond posi
tioned a
t the normal si
te of cleavage.In
teres
tingly,
the side chains of Glu233 and Asp300, along wi
th a wa
ter molecule, are aligned abou
t theinhibi
tor N-linked glycosidic bond in a manner sugges
ting
tha
t these migh
t ac
t individually or collec
tivelyin
the role of acid/base ca
talys
t in
the reac
tion mechanism. Indeed, kine
tic analyses show
tha
t subs
ti
tu
tionof
the side chains of ei
ther Glu233 or Asp300 leads
to as much as a ~10
3-fold decrease in ca
taly
ticac
tivi
ty. S
truc
tural analyses of
the Asp300Asn varian
t of human pancrea
tic
-amylase and i
ts complexwi
th acarbose clearly demons
tra
te
the impor
tance of Asp300
to
the mode of inhibi
tor binding.