S1 pocket fingerprints of human and bacterial methionine aminopeptidases determined using fluorogenic libraries of substrates and phosphorus based inhibitors

Methionine aminopeptidases: Potential therapeutic target for microsporidia and other microbes

Methionine aminopeptidases (MetAPs) have emerged as a target for medicinal chemists in the quest for novel therapeutic agents for treating cancer, obesity, and other disorders. Methionine aminopeptidase is a metalloenzyme with two structurally distinct forms in humans, MetAP-1 and MetAP-2. The MetAP2 inhibitor fumagillin, which was used as an amebicide in the 1950s, has been used for the successful treatment of microsporidiosis in humans; however, it is no longer commercially available. Despite significant efforts and investments by many pharmaceutical companies, no new MetAP inhibitors have been approved for the clinic. Several lead compounds have been designed and synthesized by researchers as potential inhibitors of MetAP and evaluated for their potential activity in a wide range of diseases. MetAP inhibitors such as fumagillin, TNP-470, beloranib, and reversible inhibitors and their analogs guide new prospects for MetAP inhibitor development in the ongoing quest for new pharmacological indications. This perspective provides insights into recent advances related to MetAP, as a potential therapeutic target in drug discovery, bioactive small molecule MetAP2 inhibitors, and data on the role of MetAP-2 as a therapeutic target for microsporidiosis.

Non-Canonical Amino Acids in Analyses of Protease Structure and Function

All known organisms encode 20 canonical amino acids by base triplets in the genetic code. The cellular translational machinery produces proteins consisting mainly of these amino acids. Several hundred natural amino acids serve important functions in metabolism, as scaffold molecules, and in signal transduction. New side chains are generated mainly by post-translational modifications, while others have altered backbones, such as the β- or γ-amino acids, or they undergo stereochemical inversion, e.g., in the case of D-amino acids. In addition, the number of non-canonical amino acids has further increased by chemical syntheses. Since many of these non-canonical amino acids confer resistance to proteolytic degradation, they are potential protease inhibitors and tools for specificity profiling studies in substrate optimization and enzyme inhibition. Other applications include in vitro and in vivo studies of enzyme kinetics, molecular interactions and bioimaging, to name a few. Amino acids with bio-orthogonal labels are particularly attractive, enabling various cross-link and click reactions for structure-functional studies. Here, we cover the latest developments in protease research with non-canonical amino acids, which opens up a great potential, e.g., for novel prodrugs activated by proteases or for other pharmaceutical compounds, some of which have already reached the clinical trial stage.

Biochemical evidences for M1-, M17- and M18-like aminopeptidases in marine invertebrates from Cuban coastline

Metallo-aminopeptidases (mAPs) control many physiological processes. They are classified in different families according to structural similarities. Neutral mAPs catalyze the cleavage of neutral amino acids from the N-terminus of proteins or peptide substrates; they need one or two metallic cofactors in their active site. Information about marine invertebrate's neutral mAPs properties is scarce; available data are mainly derived from genomics and cDNA studies. The goal of this work was to characterize the biochemical properties of the neutral APs activities in eight Cuban marine invertebrate species from the Phyla Mollusca, Porifera, Echinodermata, and Cnidaria. Determination of substrate specificity, optimal pH and effects of inhibitors (1,10-phenanthroline, amastatin, and bestatin) and cobalt on activity led to the identification of distinct neutral AP-like activities, whose biochemical behaviors were similar to those of the M1 and M17 families of mAPs. Additionally, M18-like glutamyl AP activities were detected. Thus, marine invertebrates express biochemical activities likely belonging to various families of metallo-aminopeptidases.

Applications of Unnatural Amino Acids in Protease Probes

Since proteases are involved in a wide range of physiological and disease states, the development of novel tools for imaging proteolytic enzyme activity is attracting increasing interest from scientists. Peptide substrates containing proteinogenic amino acids are often the first line of defining enzyme specificity. This Minireview outlines examples of major recent advances in probing proteases using unnatural amino acid residues, which greatly expands the possibilities for designing substrate probes and inhibitory activity-based probes. This approach already yielded innovative probes that selectively target only one active protease within the group of enzymes exhibiting similar specificity both in cellular assays and in bioimaging research.

Neutral metalloaminopeptidases APN and MetAP2 as newly discovered anticancer molecular targets of actinomycin D and its simple analogs

The potent transcription inhibitor Actinomycin D is used with several cancers. Here, we report the discovery that this naturally occurring antibiotic inhibits two human neutral aminopeptidases, the cell-surface alanine aminopeptidase and intracellular methionine aminopeptidase type 2. These metallo-containing exopeptidases participate in tumor cell expansion and motility and are targets for anticancer therapies. We show that the peptide portions of Actinomycin D and Actinomycin X₂ are not required for effective inhibition, but the loss of these regions changes the mechanism of interaction. Two structurally less complex Actinomycin D analogs containing the phenoxazone chromophores, Questiomycin A and Actinocin, appear to be competitive inhibitors of both aminopeptidases, with potencies similar to the non-competitive macrocyclic parent compound (K_i in the micromolar range). The mode of action for all four compounds and both enzymes was demonstrated by molecular modeling and docking in the corresponding active sites. This knowledge gives new perspectives to Actinomycin D's action on tumors and suggests new avenues and molecules for medical applications.

Emerging challenges in the design of selective substrates, inhibitors and activity-based probes for indistinguishable proteases

Proteases are enzymes that hydrolyze the peptide bond of peptide substrates and proteins. Despite significant progress in recent years, one of the greatest challenges in the design and testing of substrates, inhibitors and activity‐based probes for proteolytic enzymes is achieving specificity toward only one enzyme. This specificity is particularly important if the enzyme is present with other enzymes with a similar catalytic mechanism and substrate specificity but completely different functionality. The cross‐reactivity of substrates, inhibitors and activity‐based probes with other enzymes can significantly impair or even prevent investigations of a target protease. In this review, we describe important concepts and the latest challenges, focusing mainly on peptide‐based substrate specificity techniques used to distinguish individual enzymes within major protease families.

The unique functional role of the C–H⋯S hydrogen bond in the substrate specificity and enzyme catalysis of type 1 methionine aminopeptidase

Unique C–H⋯S hydrogen bonding interactions allow nature to attain recognition specificity between molecular interfaces where there is no apparent scope for classical hydrogen bonding or polar interactions.

Activity profiling of aminopeptidases in cell lysates using a fluorogenic substrate library

Aminopeptidases are exopeptidases that process peptide bonds at the N-terminus of protein substrates, and they are involved in controlling several metabolic pathways. Due to their involvement in diseases such as cancer or rheumatoid arthritis, their presence can also be used as a predictive biomarker. Here, we used a library of fluorogenic substrates containing natural and unnatural amino acids to reliably measure the aminopeptidase N (APN) activity in cell lysates obtained from human, pig and rat kidneys. We compared our results to the substrate specificity profile of isolated APN. Our data strongly support the observation that fluorogenic substrates can be successfully used to identify aminopeptidases and to measure their activity in cell lysates. Moreover, in contrast to assays using single substrates, which can result in overlapping specificity due to cleavage by several aminopeptidases, our library fingerprint can provide information about single enzymes.

Identification of the molecular basis of inhibitor selectivity between the human and streptococcal type I methionine aminopeptidases

The methionine aminopeptidase (MetAP) family is responsible for the cleavage of the initiator methionine from newly synthesized proteins. Currently, there are no small molecule inhibitors that show selectivity toward the bacterial MetAPs compared to the human enzyme. In our current study, we have screened 20 α-aminophosphonate derivatives and identified a molecule (compound 15) that selectively inhibits the S. pneumonia MetAP in low micromolar range but not the human enzyme. Further bioinformatics, biochemical, and structural analyses suggested that phenylalanine (F309) in the human enzyme and methionine (M205) in the S. pneumonia MetAP at the analogous position render them with different susceptibilities against the identified inhibitor. X-ray crystal structures of various inhibitors in complex with wild type and F309M enzyme further established the molecular basis for the inhibitor selectivity.

Promiscuity and selectivity in covalent enzyme inhibition: a systematic study of electrophilic fragments

Covalent ligand-target interactions offer significant pharmacological advantages. However, off-target reactivity of the reactive groups, which usually have electrophilic properties, must be minimized, and the selectivity of irreversible inhibitors is a crucial requirement. We therefore performed a systematic study to determine the selectivity of several electrophilic groups that can be used as building blocks for covalently binding ligands. Six reactive groups with modulated electrophilicity were combined with 11 nonreactive moieties, resulting in a small combinatorial library of 72 fragment-like compounds. These compounds were screened against a group of 11 enzyme targets to assess their selectivity and their potential for promiscuous binding to proteins. The assay results showed a considerably lower degree of promiscuity than initially expected, even for those members of the screening collection that contain supposedly highly reactive electrophiles.

A remarkable activity of human leukotriene A4 hydrolase (LTA4H) toward unnatural amino acids

Leukotriene A₄ hydrolase (LTA4H––EC 3.3.2.6) is a bifunctional zinc metalloenzyme, which processes LTA₄ through an epoxide hydrolase activity and is also able to trim one amino acid at a time from N-terminal peptidic substrates via its aminopeptidase activity. In this report, we have utilized a library of 130 individual proteinogenic and unnatural amino acid fluorogenic substrates to determine the aminopeptidase specificity of this enzyme. We have found that the best proteinogenic amino acid recognized by LTA4H is arginine. However, we have also observed several unnatural amino acids, which were significantly better in terms of cleavage rate (k_cat/K_m values). Among them, the benzyl ester of aspartic acid exhibited a k_cat/K_m value that was more than two orders of magnitude higher (1.75 × 10⁵ M⁻¹ s⁻¹) as compared to l-Arg (1.5 × 10³ M⁻¹ s⁻¹). This information can be used for design of potent inhibitors of this enzyme, but may also suggest yet undiscovered functions or specificities of LTA4H.

An integrated approach to the ligand binding specificity of Neisseria meningitidis M1 alanine aminopeptidase by fluorogenic substrate profiling, inhibitory studies and molecular modeling

Neisseria meningitides is a gram-negative diplococcus bacterium and is the main causative agent of meningitis and other meningococcal diseases. Alanine aminopeptidase from N. meningitides (NmAPN) belongs to the family of metallo-exopeptidase enzymes, which catalyze the removal of amino acids from the N-terminus of peptides and proteins, and are found among all the kingdoms of life. NmAPN is suggested to be mostly responsible for proteolysis and nutrition delivery, similar to the orthologs from other bacteria. To explore the possibility of NmAPN being a potential drug target for inhibition and development of novel therapeutic agents, the specificity of the S1 and S1' binding sites was explored using an integrated approach. Initially, an extensive library consisting of almost 100 fluorogenic substrates derived from both natural and unnatural amino acids, were used to obtain a detailed substrate fingerprint of the S1 pocket of NmAPN. A broad substrate tolerance of NmAPN was revealed, with bulky basic and hydrophobic ligands being the most favored substrates. Additionally, the potency of a set of organophosphorus inhibitors of neutral aminopeptidases, amino acid and dipeptide analogs was determined. Inhibition constants in the nanomolar range, determined for phosphinic dipeptides, proves the positive increase in inhibition impact of the P1' ligand elongation. The results were further verified via molecular modeling and docking of canonical aminopeptidase phosphinic dipeptide inhibitors in the NmAPN active site. These studies present comprehensive characterization of interactions responsible for specific ligand binding. This knowledge provides invaluable insight into understanding of the enzyme and development of novel NmAPN inhibitors.