1. The molecular mass of aspartate transcarbamoylase purified from wheat germ was found to be 101kDa by sucrose-density-gradient centrifugation, 103kDa by gel-filtration chromatography and 108kDa by polyacrylamide-gel electrophoresis. A mean value of 104 +/- 11kDa was obtained by pooling several replicate results from each method. 2. Polyacrylamide-gel electrophoresis in the presence of sodium dodecyl sulphate indicated a single size of polypeptide chain of mean molecular mass 37 +/- 4kDa. The ratio of the mean molecular masses of the active and denatured enzymes is 2.8.3. When the active enzyme was covalently cross-linked at a low protein concentration by dimethyl suberimidate, and then examined electrophoretically under denaturing conditions, three size species were observed to predominate, of apparent molecular masses 36, 77 and 106kDa respectively. 4. These results indicate that the intact, fully regulatory enzyme is a simple trimer, slightly larger than the trimeric "catalytic subunit' of the aspartate transcarbamoylase from Escherichia coli [Weber (1968) Nature (London) 218, 1116-1118]. The prevalence of trimeric structures amongst carbamoyl-transferase enzymes is discussed.

1. The steady-state kinetics of the bisubstrate reaction catalysed by aspartate transcarbamoylase purified from wheat (Triticum vulgare)-germ have been studied at 25 degrees C, pH 8.5 AND I 0.10-0.12. Initial-velocity and product-inhibition results are consistent with an ordered sequential mechanism in which carbamoyl phosphate is the first substrate to bind, followed by L-aspartate, and carbamoyl aspartate is the first product to leave, followed by Pi. The order of substrate addition is supported by dead-end inhibition studies using pyrophosphate and maleate as inhibitory analogues of the substrates. Product inhibition permitted a minimum value for the dissociation constant of L-aspartate from the ternary complex to be estimated. This minimum is of the same order as the dissociation constant (Ki) of succinate. 2. A range of dicarboxy analogues of L-aspartate were tested as possible inhibitors of the enzyme. These studies suggested that L-aspartate is bound with its carboxy groups in the eclipsed configuration, and that the stereochemical constraints around the binding site are very similar to those reported for the catalytic subunit of the enzyme from Escherichia coli [Davies, Vanaman & Stark (1970) J. Biol. Chem. 245, 1175-1179].

1. Aspartate transcarbamoylase was purified approx. 3000-fold from wheat (Triticum vulgare) germ in 15-20% yield. The product has a specific activity of 14 mumol/min per mg of protein and is approx. 90% pure. The purification scheme includes the use of biospecific "imphilyte" chromatography as described by Yon [Biochem.J.(1977) 161, 233-237]. The enzyme was passed successively through columns of CPAD [N-(3-carboxypropionyl)aminodecyl]-Sepharose in the absence and presence respectively of the ligands UMP and L-aspartate. In the second passage the enzyme was specifically displaced away from impurities with which it co-migrated in the first passage. These two steps contributed a factor of 80 to the overall purification. 2. The enzyme is slowly inactivated on dilution at 0 degrees C and pH 7.0, the inactivation being partially reversible. A detailed investigation of the temperature- and pH-dependence of the cold-inactivation suggested that it was initiated by the perturbation of the pKa values of groups with a moderately high and positive heat of ionization, which were tentatively identified as histidine residues. These findings support a new concept of cold-lability proposed by Bock, Gilbert & Frieden [Biochem. Biophys. Res. Commun. (1975) 66, 564-569].

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