Gene/Protein Disease Symptom Drug Enzyme Compound
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Query: UNIPROT:P00750 (PLA)
 16,800 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

Procedures were developed for isolating highly purified cytoplasmic granules of basophilic leukocytes from guinea pig peripheral blood. The methods involved disruption of cells in 0.34 M sucrose followed by a series of membrane filtrations and fractionation on sucrose density gradients. These preparations, up to 95% pure basophil granules by electron microscopy, contained a mixture of neutral esterases-proteases including caseinolytic activity; both trypsin- and chymotrypsin-like serine hydrolases were identified by means of appropriate inhibitors. Localization of at least one such activity to the basophil granule was confirmed by a cytochemical method; this activity was absent in contaminating lymphocytes and eosinophils. By contrast, several lysosomal enzymes, lactic dehydrogenase, and plasminogen activator activity, present in cell homogenates, were absent from purified granules. The granule matrix of guinea pig basophils, unlike the cytoplasmic granules of other granulocytes or mast cells, was little altered by high or low salt concentration but was disrupted into insoluble fragments by 0.01 N HCl and by Triton X-100. Granules were solubilized by papain and by urea-SDS but enzyme activity was destroyed. Triton X-100 incubation with freeze-thawing proved to be the optimal method for extracting esterase activities. Esterase activities were not released from basophils under conditions of anaphylactic degranulation that liberated the great majority of basophil granule histamine.
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PMID:Isolation of the cytoplasmic granules of guinea pig basophilic leukocytes: identification of esterase and protease activities. 87 25

Since a few thousand years ago, the earthworm has been used as a drug for various diseases in China and the Far East. However, modern scientific pharmacological studies have not so far been performed. We extracted a very strong fibrinolytic enzyme from the earthworm, Lumbricus rubellus. This enzyme was heat-stable and displayed a very broad optimal pH range. Purification of the enzyme was performed and three partially purified fractions were obtained. These three fractions were further subdivided, and six purified fractions (F-I-0, 1, 2, F-II, and F-III-1,2) were finally obtained. Based on results of their enzymatic activities against various substrates, the fraction I enzymes are thought to represent chymotrypsin-like enzymes and the fraction III enzymes to represent trypsin-like enzymes. The fraction II enzyme appears to be neither a trypsin-nor chymotrypsin-like enzyme nor an elastase. We therefore designed trials for in vivo experiments on human volunteers. 120 mg of lyophilized earthworm powder was administered orally to 7 healthy volunteers (aged 28-52 years old) three times after meals every day for 17 days. Blood was withdrawn once a day before and at 1, 2, 3, 8, 11 and 17 days after commencing the administration. The fibrin degradation products (FDP) value, tissue plasminogen activator (t-PA) antigen level and t-PA activities were measured in the blood. Before the administration, the t-PA antigen level was 5.6 +/- 0.38 ng/ml, and it gradually increased until the 17th day. The FDP level was increased on the 1st and 2nd day after the administration, but had decreased and normalized by the 17th day. The fibrinolytic activities also tended to show an increase during the experiment. These results suggest that earthworm powder represents a possible oral thrombolytic agent. The earthworm enzyme may thus be applicable for treating patients with thalassemia.
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PMID:Novel thrombolytic therapy discovered from traditional oriental medicine using the earthworm. 129 86

A chymostatin-sensitive step in the release of plasminogen activator from transformed fibroblasts has been described recently. By using synthetic peptidyl substrates, we have detected and characterized a chymostatin-sensitive peptidase activity in chicken embryo fibroblasts transformed by Rous sarcoma virus. The activity represents a neutral endopeptidase that exhibits phenylalanine specificity and is inhibited by diisopropyl fluorophosphate. A detailed inhibitor profile of the enzyme activity shows that it is distinct from other chymotrypsin-like phenylalanine-preferring peptidases. The endopeptidase activity in transformed fibroblasts is increased over that of parallel cultures of normal fibroblasts. The mechanism of enzyme inhibition by chymostatin is indicated by these studies, and the possible role of the enzyme in modulating plasminogen activator secretion is discussed.
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PMID:Detection and partial characterization of a chymostatin-sensitive endopeptidase in transformed fibroblasts. 630 Aug 32

Specimens of the rabbit V2 carcinoma were maintained in organ culture to study the secretion of proteinases. Elastase-like, chymotrypsin-like, plasminogen activator-like, cathepsin B-like and collagenase activities were assayed with sensitive fluorimetric techniques. Of these enzymes, the only activities that were secreted in considerable amounts in primary cultures of tumor tissue were collagenase and a cysteine proteinase resembling cathepsin B. Co-cultures of intraperitoneally grown tumor and normal subcutaneous tissue of the rabbit resulted in significantly higher production of the cysteine proteinase and collagenase compared to the sum of the activities of the separate tissues. Explants of subcutaneous tissue of tumor-bearing rabbits secreted significantly more cysteine proteinase and collagenase than explants from normal animals. Explants from normal subcutaneous tissue stimulated with tumor-conditioned culture medium secreted both enzymes in higher amounts compared to the controls. The cysteine proteinase was similar in some properties to rabbit liver cathepsin B, but the enzyme from the tumor-host system showed a remarkable stability to a moderately alkaline pH. We suggest that a diffusible factor, derived from the tumor or immigrated cells, promotes an increased synthesis and secretion of collagenase and cysteine proteinase in the host, and that both enzymes may play cooperative roles during invasion of the surrounding tissues by the V2 carcinoma.
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PMID:Extracellular cysteine proteinase and collagenase activities as a consequence of tumor-host interaction in the rabbit V2 carcinoma. 632 87

Serial transplantation of a spontaneous BDX rat tumor, classified as an anaplastic sarcoma, gives rise to two variants; a rapidly growing nonmetastatic line (AS) and a slowly growing, invasive, and highly metastatic variant (ASML). The availability of two cell lines of the same origin but with markedly differing metastatic potential offers an ideal model for the identification of the cellular properties involved in invasive and/or metastatic behavior. The present work focuses on the pattern of various proteinases in the two tumor cell variants. The findings disclosed one major consistent difference which relates to a cathepsin B-like cysteine proteinase. The metastatic ASML variant manifests exceedingly high intracellular cathepsin B-like activity; in the nonmetastatic AS variant, the activity of this proteinase is significantly lower. Other proteinases, in particular elastase-like, chymotrypsin-like, collagenase-like enzymes and plasminogen activator, showed low, essentially comparable activity patterns. Thus, cathepsin B-like proteinase is a marker enzyme of the metastatic ASML tumor cell variant.
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PMID:Cathepsin B-like proteinase as a marker for metastatic tumor cell variants. 638 97

At present, there is no established diagnostic method by which the metastatic ability of an individual prostatic cancer can be accurately predicted. Metastasis is a multistep process, the first critical step of which is invasion. Tumor invasion has been suggested to involve a variety of hydrolytic enzyme activities; therefore, the tumor levels of these activities might be indicative of the overall metastatic ability of the cancer. In order to evaluate if the quantitative levels of hydrolytic enzymes can be used to predict the metastatic ability of individual prostatic cancers, five different Dunning R-3327 rat prostatic adenocarcinoma sublines, with widely varying metastatic abilities, were assayed for the respective levels of a variety of hydrolytic enzyme activities (collagenase, trypsin-like, cathepsin B, neutral protease, N-acetyl-beta-glucosaminidase, chymotrypsin-like, leucine aminopeptidase, elastase, and plasminogen activator). These studies demonstrated that most hydrolytic activities are not elevated when going from normal prostate to prostatic cancer. In addition, only the levels of elastase and chymotrypsin-like activity were found to be consistently higher in highly metastatic prostatic cancers than in either the normal prostate or low-metastatic prostatic cancers. It was found that, by combining the relative activities of elastase and chymotrypsin-like activity and then dividing by the relative activities of N-acetyl-beta-glucosaminidase, a biochemical metastatic index could be constructed which accurately reflected the respective metastatic ability of the Dunning sublines.
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PMID:Biochemical methods for predicting metastatic ability of prostatic cancer utilizing the dunning R-3327 rat prostatic adenocarcinoma system as a model. 653 99

Unlike most proteases, tissue-type plasminogen activator (t-PA) is not synthesized as an inactive precursor or zymogen. Instead, the single-chain "proenzyme" form of t-PA possesses very significant catalytic activity. Recent investigations of the molecular basis of the unusually high enzymatic activity of single-chain t-PA have focused attention upon Asp-194, a residue that is invariant among chymotrypsin-like enzymes. The critical role of this residue in securing the active conformation of mature chymotrypsin-like enzymes has been discussed extensively. Subsequent work, however, has indicated that this conserved residue can also form interactions that dramatically influence the catalytic activity of serine protease zymogens. While Asp-194 forms interactions that suppress the activity of the zymogen chymotrypsinogen, it may, by contrast, directly promote the catalytically active conformation of single-chain t-PA. To test the hypothesis that Asp-194 promotes the activity of both single- and two-chain t-PA and therefore plays opposing roles in single-chain t-PA and chymotrypsinogen, and also to examine whether this invariant residue plays an essential role in the stimulation of t-PA by fibrin, we used site-directed mutagenesis to construct the following variants of t-PA: t-PA/D194E, t-PA/D194N, t-PA/R15E,D194E, and t-PA/R15E,D194N. In the absence of fibrin, the activity of enzymes carrying a mutation at position 194 was reduced by factors of 1000-2000 compared to wild type t-PA. Similar reductions of activity were observed for both single- and two-chain variants, suggesting an important role for Asp-194 in both forms of the enzyme. The mutated enzymes, however, displayed a dramatically enhanced response to fibrin monomers. While the activity of wild type t-PA was stimulated by fibrin monomers by a factor of 960, the corresponding stimulation factor for the mutated enzymes varied from 498,000-1,050,000.
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PMID:Variants of tissue-type plasminogen activator with substantially enhanced response and selectivity toward fibrin co-factors. 755 5

Brain serine proteases are implicated in developmental processes, synaptic plasticity, and in disorders including Alzheimer's disease. The spectrum of the major enzymes expressed in brain has not been established previously. We now present a systematic study of the serine proteases expressed in adult rat and mouse hippocampus. Using a combination of techniques including polymerase chain reaction amplification and Northern blotting we show that tissue-type plasminogen activator (t-PA) is the major species represented. Unexpectedly, the next most abundant species were RNK-Met-1, a lymphocyte protease not reported previously in brain, and two new family members, BSP1 (brain serine protease 1) and BSP2. We report full-length sequences of the two new proteases; homologies indicate that these are of tryptic specificity. Although BSP2 is expressed in several brain regions, BSP1 expression is strikingly restricted to hippocampus. Other enzymes represented, but at lower levels, included elastase IV, proteinase 3, complement C2, chymotrypsin B, chymotrypsin-like protein, and Hageman factor. Although thrombin and urokinase-type plasminogen activator were not detected in the primary screen, low level expression was confirmed using specific polymerase chain reaction primers. In contrast, and despite robust expression of t-PA, the usual t-PA substrate plasminogen was not expressed at detectable levels.
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PMID:Serine proteases in rodent hippocampus. 972 24

In the present study, we determined the impact of 5 and 10 days of muscle deconditioning induced by hindlimb suspension (HS) on the ubiquitin-proteasome system of protein degradation and caspase enzyme activities in rat soleus muscles. A second goal was to determine whether activities of matrix metalloproteinase-2/9 (MMP-2/9) and urokinase-type/tissue-type plasminogen activator (PAs) were responsive to HS. As expected, HS led to a pronounced atrophy of soleus muscle. Level of ubiquitinated proteins, chymotrypsin-like activity of 20S proteasome, and Bcl-2-associated gene product-1 protein level were all transitory increased in response to 5 days of HS. These changes may thus potentially account for the decrease in muscle mass observed in response to 5 days of HS. Caspase-3 activity was significantly increased throughout the experimental period, whereas activities of caspase-6, another effector caspase, and caspase-9, the mitochondrial-dependent activator of both caspase-3 and -6, were only increased in response to 10 days of HS. This suggests that caspase-3 may be regulated through mitochondrial-independent and mitochondrial-dependent mechanisms in response to HS. Finally, MMP-2/9 activities remained unchanged, whereas PAs activities were increased after 5 days of HS. Overall, these data suggest that time-dependent regulation of intracellular and extracellular proteinases are important in setting the new phenotype of rat soleus muscle in response to HS.
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PMID:Regulation of ubiquitin-proteasome system, caspase enzyme activities, and extracellular proteinases in rat soleus muscle in response to unloading. 1733 80

Snakebite envenoming is a serious medical problem in different areas of the world. In Latin America, the major prevalence is due to snakes of the family Viperidae, where rattlesnakes (Crotalus) are included. They produce hemotoxic venom which causes bleeding, tissue degradation and necrosis. Each venom has several enzymatic activities, producing different effects in the envenoming, doing its clinical effects difficult to study. Comparison between venom molecules is also difficult when different techniques are used, and therefore, their identification/characterization using the same methodology is necessary. In this work, a general biochemical characterization in snake venom of serine proteases (SVSP), phospholipases A2 (PLA2), metalloproteases (SVMP) and hyaluronidases (SVH) of Crotalus aquilus (Ca), Crotalus polystictus (Cp) and Crotalus molossus nigrescens (Cmn) was done. Differences in protein pattern, enzyme content and enzymatic activities were observed. All the venoms showed high PLA2 activity, high molecular weight SVSP, and a wide variety of SVMP and SVH forms. Ca and Cp showed the highest enzymatic activities of SVMP and SVSP trypsin-like and chymotrypsin-like, whereas Cmn showed the highest SVH and similar PLA2 activity with Ca. All the venoms showed peptides with similar molecular weight to crotamine-like myotoxins. No previous biochemical characterization of C. aquilus has been reported and there are no previous analyses that include these four protein families in these Crotalus venoms.
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PMID:Snake Venom Hemotoxic Enzymes: Biochemical Comparison between Crotalus Species from Central Mexico. 3101 25


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