Lj. Gordon et Ww. Lilly, QUANTITATIVE-ANALYSIS OF SCHIZOPHYLLUM-COMMUNE METALLOPROTEASE SCPRB ACTIVITY IN SDS-GELATIN PAGE REVEALS DIFFERENTIAL MYCELIAL LOCALIZATION OF NITROGEN LIMITATION-INDUCED AUTOLYSIS, Current microbiology, 30(6), 1995, pp. 337-343
The basidiomycete Schizophyllum commune produces a variety of proteoly
tic enzymes. A number of these, detected in native gelatin-containing
polyacrylamide gels, have their activities increased during nitrogen-l
imited growth of the mycelium. ScPrB, a metallo-endoprotease, appears
to have the greatest nitrogen stress-induced increase in activity of a
ll of these enzymes. Quantifying ScPrB has proven difficult because no
artificial chromogenic substrate has been found. In addition, it is p
oorly resolved from another highly active protease, ScPrA, in native g
elatin-containing gels. We have developed a method using SDS gelatin-c
ontaining polyacrylamide gels for resolving ScPrB from ScPrA and for q
uantifying its activity by densitometry. This method was used to asses
s the intramycelial location of ScPrB induction after the transfer of
exponentially growing colonies to nitrogen deprivation conditions. By
all analyses (proportional, normalized to fresh weight, and normalized
to protein), the increase in ScPrB activity was found to occur exclus
ively in midsections of the growing mycelium, whereas ScPrB activity w
as found to be decreased or unchanged in the centers of colonies and i
n colony margins. This implies that proteolysis mediated by ScPrB may
supply translocatable amino acids only from the region directly behind
the growing hyphal apices.