A sensitive mass spectrum assay to characterize engineered methionine adenosyltransferases with S-alkyl methionine analogues as substrates Journal Article


Authors: Wang, R.; Zheng, W.; Luo, M.
Article Title: A sensitive mass spectrum assay to characterize engineered methionine adenosyltransferases with S-alkyl methionine analogues as substrates
Abstract: Methionine adenosyltransferases (MATs) catalyze the formation of S-adenosyl-l-methionine (SAM) inside living cells. Recently, S-alkyl analogues of SAM have been documented as cofactor surrogates to label novel targets of methyltransferases. However, these chemically synthesized SAM analogues are not suitable for cell-based studies because of their poor membrane permeability. This issue was recently addressed under a cellular setting through a chemoenzymatic strategy to process membrane-permeable S-alkyl analogues of methionine (SAAMs) into the SAM analogues with engineered MATs. Here we describe a general sensitive activity assay for engineered MATs by converting the reaction products into S-alkylthioadenosines, followed by high-performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (HPLC-MS/MS) quantification. With this assay, 40 human MAT mutants were evaluated against 7 SAAMs as potential substrates. The structure-activity relationship revealed that, besides better engaged SAAM binding by the MAT mutants (lower Km value in contrast to native MATs), the gained activity toward the bulky SAAMs stems from their ability to maintain the desired linear SN2 transition state (reflected by higher kcat value). Here the I117A mutant of human MATI was identified as the most active variant for biochemical production of SAM analogues from diverse SAAMs. © 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Keywords: methyltransferase; epigenetics; lc-ms/ms; s-adenosyl-l-methionine; mat
Journal Title: Analytical Biochemistry
Volume: 450
Issue: 1
ISSN: 0003-2697
Publisher: Academic Press, Elsevier Inc  
Date Published: 2014-04-01
Start Page: 11
End Page: 19
Language: English
DOI: 10.1016/j.ab.2013.12.026
PROVIDER: scopus
PMCID: PMC3947680
PUBMED: 24374249
DOI/URL:
Notes: Export Date: 3 March 2014 -- CODEN: ANBCA -- Source: Scopus
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MSK Authors
  1. Weihong Zheng
    11 Zheng
  2. Minkui Luo
    70 Luo
  3. Rui Wang
    8 Wang