Fluorometric Assay: All measurements were performed with a BioAssay Reader HTS-7000Plus for microplates (Perkin Elmer) at 30C. QC activity was evaluated fluorometrically using H-Gln-beta NA. The samples consisted of 0.2 mM fluorogenic substrate, 0.25 U pyroglutamyl aminopeptidase (Unizyme, Horsholm, Denmark) in 0.2 M Tris/HCl, pH 8.0 containing 20 mM EDTA and an appropriately diluted aliquot of QC in a final volume of 250 ul. Excitation/emission wavelengths were 320/410 nm. The assay reactions were initiated by addition of glutaminyl cyclase. QC activity was determined from a standard curve of beta -naphthylamine under assay conditions. One unit is defined as the amount of QC catalyzing the formation of 1 umol pGlu-beta NA from H-Gln-beta NA per minute under the described conditions. In a second fluorometric assay, QC was activity determined using H-Gln-AMC as substrate. Reactions were carried out at 30C. utilizing the NOVOStar reader for microplates (BMG labtechnologies).
Spectrophotometric Assay: This novel assay was used to determine the kinetic parameters for most of the QC substrates. QC activity was analyzed spectrophotometrically using a continuous method, that was derived by adapting a previous discontinuous assay (Bateman, R. C. J. 1989 J Neurosci Methods 30, 23-28) utilizing glutamate dehydrogenase as auxiliary enzyme. Samples consisted of the respective QC substrate, 0.3 mM NADH, 14 mM α-Ketoglutaric acid and 30 U/ml glutamate dehydrogenase in a final volume of 250 ul. Reactions were started by addition of QC and perused by monitoring of the decrease in absorbance at 340 nm for 8-15 min.The initial velocities were evaluated and the enzymatic activity was determined from a standard curve of ammonia under assay conditions. All samples were measured at 30° C., using either the SPECTRAFluor Plus or the Sunrise (both from TECAN) reader for microplates. Kinetic data was evaluated using GraFit software.
Inhibition of recombinant human isoQC using H-Gln-AMC hydrobromide as fluorogenic substrate incubated for 6 hrs by fluorometric microplate reader analysis