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The Retaining Mechanism of Xylose Transfer Catalyzed by Xyloside α-1,3-Xylosyltransferase (XXYLT1): a Quantum Mechanics/Molecular Mechanics Study

Yan L, Liu Y

Journal of chemical information and modeling, 2020

Abstract

Glycosyltransferases (GTs) are a ubiquitous group of enzymes that catalyze the synthesis of glycosidic bonds. In this work, we focused on the retained reaction catalyzed by xyloside α-1,3-xylosyltransferase (XXYLT1) from Mus musculus. Our calculations revealed that the xylose transfer reaction follows the SNi-like mechanism, which involves a short-lived oxocarbenium-phosphate ion-pair intermediate (IP). The previously obtained crystal structure of the UDP-Xyl ternary Michaelis reaction complex was found to be an inactive form. Accordingly, the β-phosphate oxygen O3B of the donor should first undergo a conformational change to reach an active state where the donor forms a strong hydrogen bond with the acceptor, facilitating the departure of the phosphate group. Our calculations also revealed that two predicated transition states for the sugar-phosphate bond cleavage and glycosidic bond formation are structurally similar to the short-lived intermediate, which contains a three-member ring formed by the β-phosphate oxygen, the hydroxyl oxygen in the acceptor, and the anomeric carbon. It can be considered as a typical characteristic of the SNi-like mechanism. In addition, a nearby polar residue, Q330, is responsible for stabilizing the short-lived intermediate by electrostatic interactions. Thus, the Q330A mutant can abolish the activity of XXYLT1. In addition, using UDP-glucose as the donor, our calculations revealed that glucose transfer would correspond to a higher energy…

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