J Biol Chem, Vol. 275, Issue 11, 7870-7877, March 17, 2000
TrkA Amino Acids Controlling Specificity for Nerve Growth
Factor*
Lori
O'Connell
§,
Jo-Anne
Hongo§¶,
Leonard G.
Presta
§
, and
Pantelis
Tsoulfas§**
From the
Departments of Immunology and
¶ Antibody Technology, Genentech Inc.,
South San Francisco, California 94080 and ** Department of
Neurological Surgery and The Miami Project, University of Miami School
of Medicine, Miami, Florida 33135
Neurotrophins are important for the development
and maintenance of the vertebrate nervous system, mediating their
signal into the cell by specific interaction with tyrosine kinase
receptors of the Trk family. The extracellular portion of the Trk
receptors has been previously proposed to consist of a cysteine-rich
motif, a leucine-rich motif, a second cysteine-rich motif followed by two immunoglobulin-like domains. Earlier studies have shown that a
major neurotrophin-binding site in the Trk receptors resides in the
second immunoglobulin-like domain. Although the individual amino acids
in TrkA involved in binding to nerve growth factor (NGF) and those in
TrkC involved in binding to neurotrophin-3 have been mapped in this
domain, the Trk amino acids that provide specificity remained unclear.
In this study, a minimum set of residues in the human TrkC second
immunoglobulin-like domain, which does not bind nerve growth factor
(NGF), were substituted with those from human TrkA. The resulting Trk
variant recruited binding of NGF equivalent to TrkA, maintained
neurotrophin-3 binding equivalent to TrkC, and also bound brain-derived
neurotrophin, although with lower affinity compared with TrkB. This
implies that the amino acids in the second immunoglobulin-like domain that determine Trk specificity are distinct for each Trk.
*
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