Chaperone therapy for homocystinuria: the rescue of CBS mutations by heme arginate.

Classical homocystinuria is caused by mutations in the cystathionine ß-synthase (CBS) gene. Previous experiments in bacterial and yeast cells showed that many mutant CBS enzymes misfold and that chemical chaperones enable proper folding of a number of mutations. In the present study, we tested the extent of misfolding of 27 CBS mutations previously tested in E. coli under the more folding-permissive conditions of mammalian CHO-K1 cells and the ability of chaperones to rescue the conformation of these mutations. Expression of mutations in mammalian cells increased the median activity 16-fold and the amount of tetramers 3.2-fold compared with expression in bacteria. Subsequently, we tested the responses of seven selected mutations to three compounds with chaperone-like activity. Aminooxyacetic acid and 4-phenylbutyric acid exhibited only a weak effect. In contrast, heme arginate substantially increased the formation of mutant CBS protein tetramers (up to sixfold) and rescued catalytic activity (up to ninefold) of five out of seven mutations (p.A114V, p.K102N, p.R125Q, p.R266K, and p.R369C). The greatest effect of heme arginate was observed for the mutation p.R125Q, which is non-responsive to in vivo treatment with vitamin B(6). Moreover, the heme responsiveness of the p.R125Q mutation was confirmed in fibroblasts derived from a patient homozygous for this genetic variant. Based on these data, we propose that a distinct group of heme-responsive CBS mutations may exist and that the heme pocket of CBS may become an important target for designing novel therapies for homocystinuria.

Cystathionine beta-synthase mutations: effect of mutation topology on folding and activity.

Misfolding of mutant enzymes may play an important role in the pathogenesis of cystathionine beta-synthase (CBS) deficiency. We examined properties of a series of 27 mutant variants, which together represent 70% of known alleles observed in patients with homocystinuria due to CBS deficiency. The median amount of SDS-soluble mutant CBS polypeptides in the pellet after centrifugation of bacterial extracts was increased by 50% compared to the wild type. Moreover, mutants formed on average only 12% of tetramers and their median activity reached only 3% of the wild-type enzyme. In contrast to the wild-type CBS about half of mutants were not activated by S-adenosylmethionine. Expression at 18 degrees C substantially increased the activity of five mutants in parallel with increasing the amounts of tetramers. We further analyzed the role of solvent accessibility of mutants as a determinant of their folding and activity. Buried mutations formed on average less tetramers and exhibited 23 times lower activity than the solvent exposed mutations. In summary, our results show that topology of mutations predicts in part the behavior of mutant CBS, and that misfolding may be an important and frequent pathogenic mechanism in CBS deficiency.

Birth prevalence of homocystinuria in Central Europe: frequency and pathogenicity of mutation c.1105C>T (p.R369C) in the cystathionine beta-synthase gene.

OBJECTIVES: To estimate the frequency of the cystathionine beta-synthase deficiency caused by c.1105C>T mutation in Central Europe compared to Norway, and to examine the pathogenicity of the corresponding p.R369C mutant enzyme. STUDY DESIGN: Mutation c.1105C>T was analyzed in 600 anonymous Czech newborn blood spots. Catalytic activity and quaternary structure of the p.R369C mutant was evaluated after expression in 2 cellular systems. RESULTS: Population frequency of the c.1105C>T mutation was 0.005, predicting the birth prevalence of homocystinuria of 1:40000, which increased to 1:15500 in a model including 10 additional mutations. In Escherichia coli the p.R369C mutant misfolded, and its activity was severely reduced, and expression in Chinese hamster ovary cells enabled proper folding with activity decreased to 63% of the wild-type enzyme. This decreased activity was not due to impaired K(m) for both substrates but resulted from V(max) lowered to 55% of the normal cystathionine beta-synthase enzyme. CONCLUSIONS: The c.1105C>T (p.R369C) allele is common also in the Czech population. Although the p.R369C mutation impairs folding and decreases velocity of the enzymatic reaction, our data are congruent with rather mild clinical phenotype in homozygotes or compound heterozygotes carrying this mutation.

Identification and functional analysis of two novel mutations in the CBS gene in Polish patients with homocystinuria.

Homocystinuria due to cystathionine beta-synthase (CBS) deficiency is an inherited disorder of homocysteine transsulfuration, which manifests by neurological, vascular and connective tissue involvement. So far, 130 pathogenic mutations have been recognized in the CBS gene. We examined 10 independent alleles in Polish patients suffering from CBS deficiency, and we detected four already described mutations (c.1224-2A>C, c.684C>A, c.833T>C, and c.442G>A) and two novel mutations (c.429C>G and c.1039+1G>T). The pathogenicity of the novel mutations was demonstrated by expression in E.coli. This is the first published communication on mutations leading to CBS deficiency in Poland.

The cystathionine beta-synthase (CBS) mutation c.1224-2A>C in Central Europe: Vitamin B6 nonresponsiveness and a common ancestral haplotype.

In homocystinuria due to cystathionine beta-synthase (CBS) deficiency, vitamin B6 response has been linked to distinct mutations and ruled out for others. The splice site mutation c.1224-2A>C leading to the deletion of exon 12 is predominantly found in patients from Central Europe, where it has been found on in average 14% of mutant alleles. In this study we analyzed the clinical picture in 17 CBS deficient carriers of c.1224-2A>C. Homozygotes for c.1224-2A>C did not respond to vitamin B6, while in compound heterozygotes the response to vitamin B6 depended on the mutation on the second allele. Maximum likelihood analysis revealed one common haplotype of the c.1224-2A>C alleles. Additionally, we report the four novel CBS mutations c.451G>A (p.Gly151?), c.740_769del (p.Lys247_Gly256del), c.862G>C (p.Ala288Pro) and c.1135C>T (p.Arg379Trp). In summary, the data of this study suggest that the CBS c.1224-2A>C allele confers vitamin B6 nonresponsiveness and that this mutant allele came from a common ancestor.

High homocysteine and thrombosis without connective tissue disorders are associated with a novel class of cystathionine beta-synthase (CBS) mutations.

Cystathionine beta-synthase (CBS) is a crucial regulator of plasma levels of the thrombogenic amino acid homocysteine (Hcy). Homocystinuria due to CBS deficiency confers a dramatically increased risk of thrombosis. Early diagnosis usually occurs after the observation of ectopia lentis, mental retardation, or characteristic skeletal abnormalities. Homocystinurics with this phenotype typically carry mutations in the catalytic region of the protein that abolish CBS activity. We describe a novel class of missense mutations consisting of I435T, P422L, and S466L that are located in the non-catalytic C-terminal region of CBS that yield enzymes that are catalytically active but deficient in their response to S-adenosylmethionine (AdoMet). The P422L and S466L mutations were found in patients suffering premature thrombosis and homocystinuric levels of Hcy but lacking any of the connective tissue disorders typical of homocystinuria due to CBS deficiency. The P422L and S466L mutants demonstrated a level of CBS activity comparable to that of the AdoMet stimulated wild-type CBS but could not be further induced by the addition of AdoMet. In terms of temperature stability, oligomeric organization, and heme saturation the I435T, P422L, and S466L mutants are indistinguishable from wild-type CBS. Our findings illustrate the importance of AdoMet for the regulation of Hcy metabolism and are consistent with the possibility that the characteristic connective tissue disturbances observed in homocystinuria due to CBS deficiency may not be due to elevated Hcy.

Cystathionine beta-synthase is coordinately regulated with proliferation through a redox-sensitive mechanism in cultured human cells and Saccharomyces cerevisiae.

Cystathionine beta-synthase (CBS) catalyzes the condensation of serine with homocysteine to form cystathionine and occupies a crucial regulatory position between the methionine cycle and the biosynthesis of cysteine by transsulfuration. Analysis of CBS activity under a variety of growth conditions indicated that CBS is coordinately regulated with proliferation in both yeast and human cells. In batch cultures of Saccharomyces cerevisiae, maximal CBS activities were observed in the exponential phase of cells grown on glucose, while growth-arrested cultures or those growing non-fermentatively on ethanol or glycerol had approximately 3-fold less activity. CBS activity assays and Western blotting indicated that growth-specific regulation of CBS is evolutionarily conserved in a range of human cell lines. CBS activity was found to be maximal during proliferation and was reduced two- to five-fold when cells became quiescent at confluence. In cultured HepG2 cells, the human CBS gene is induced by serum and basic fibroblast growth factor and is downregulated, but not abolished, by contact inhibition, serum-starvation, nutrient depletion, or the induction of differentiation. Consequently, for certain cell types, CBS may represent a novel marker of both differentiation and proliferation. The intracellular level of the CBS regulator compound, S-adenosylmethionine, was found to reflect the proliferation status of both yeast and human cells, and as such, constitutes an additional mechanism for proliferation-specific regulation of human CBS. Our data indicates that screening compounds for the ability to affect transsulfuration in cultured cell models must take proliferation status into account to avoid masking regulatory interactions that may be of significance in vivo.