Exchange integral for a variety of tetranuclear ferredoxins

Nicotinic acid hydroxylase from Clostridium barkeri: electron paramagnetic resonance studies show that selenium is coordinated with molybdenum in the catalytically active selenium-dependent enzyme

Nicotinic acid hydroxylase from Clostridium barkeri contains selenium in an unidentified form that is dissociated as a low molecular weight compound upon denaturation of the enzyme. Other cofactors of this enzyme are molybdopterin, FAD, and iron-sulfur clusters. In the current study, we show that the enzyme, as isolated, exhibits a stable Mo(V) electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) signal ("resting" signal) and that this signal is correlated with the selenium content and nicotinate hydroxylase activity of the enzyme. Substitution of 77Se for normal selenium isotope abundance results in splitting of the Mo(V) EPR signal of the native protein without affecting the iron signals of the FeS clusters. The Mo(V) EPR signal and nicotinic acid hydroxylase activity of enzyme isolated from cells grown in selenium-deficient medium are barely detectable. In contrast, the EPR signals of the FeS clusters, the electronic absorption spectrum, the NADPH oxidase activity, and the chromatographic behavior are changed little and are typical of active selenium-containing enzyme. An EPR signal indicative of the presence of molybdenum in the selenium-deficient enzyme also is exhibited. From these results, we conclude that a dissociable selenium moiety is coordinated directly with molybdenum in the molybdopterin cofactor and, moreover, this selenium is essential for nicotinic acid hydroxylase activity.

Temperature dependence of the electronic spin-lattice relaxation time in a 2-iron-2-sulphur model complex

The complex [Fe2S2(S2-o-xylyl)2]2- in DMF (dimethylformamide), DMSO (dimethylsulphoxide) or a 1:1 DMF/DMSO mixture, a model for the chromophore in the 2Fe-2S proteins (ferredoxins), has been reduced and studied by conventional EPR over a temperature range. The low-field feature of the spectrum, Hz, has been computer simulated in order to analyse the lineshape in terms of a convolution product of Lorentzian and Gaussian distributions. The Gaussian contribution to the linewidth and a fixed part of the Lorentzian contribution, which is a function of the solvent and the way it freezes, were measured at a low temperature (less than or equal to 100 K) and subtracted from the linewidths in the higher-temperature range (130-200 K). The variable Lorentzian contribution thus obtained was related to spin-lattice relaxation times. The spin-lattice relaxation times of the sample having 1:1 DMSO/DMF solvent were measured in the range 6 to 11 K by the saturating pulse technique and in the range 10 to 65 K by continuous saturation methods. Up to 65 K the results follow the law 1/T1 alpha T4.5, a relationship which is not readily interpreted in terms of a simple Debye model. At higher temperatures the results may be interpreted in terms either of a dominant Orbach mechanism involving excited states at approx. 900 +/- 50 cm-1 (DMSO, DMF) or 770 +/- 50 cm-1 (1:1 DMSO/DMF), or of a Raman process in which 1/T1 alpha T7.5. The former is compatible with the two-phonon process already described in some ferredoxins, especially those with little anisotropy (gy - gx approximately 0.0) which have characteristically high [J] values.