Our understanding of the molecular details of enzyme-catalyzed phosphoryl group transfer processes is still rudimentary, despite the importance of phosphokinases in the synthesis and utilization of ATP. The methods available for mechanistic investigation of these reactions have not provided unambiguous answers to such fundamental questions as whether covalent phosphoryl-enzymes are kinetically obligatory (1) and how the rates of phosphoryl group transfers are accelerated (2). We report here a stereochemical approach to these problems, and present evidence that three kinases [pyruvate kinase (ATP: pyruvate 2-O-phosphotransferase; EC 2.7.1.40), glycerol kinase (ATP:glycerol 3-phosphotransferase; EC 2.7.1.30), and hexokinase (ATP:hexose 6-phosphotransferase; EC 2.7.1.1)] not only catalyze the phosphoryl transfers to ADP with complete stereospecificity, but that each also follows the same stereochemical course (i.e., retention or inversion) with respect to the chirality of the phosphoryl group transferred.
EXPERIMENTALThe 2-and 3-[180]phosphorothioate esters of D-glycerate, chiral at phosphorus, were prepared as shown in Figs. 1 and 2. All reactions were monitored by thin-layer chromatography, and the purified products were characterized by 31P nuclear magnetic resonance, by gas chromatography and mass spectrometry of the trimethylsilyl derivatives, and by enzymic assay where appropriate. All enzymes used were of the highest grade available from Sigma, and were dialyzed against 100 mM triethanolamine-HCl buffer, pH 7.5. D-Glyceric acid was converted into its methyl ester by using diazomethane, and a mixture of the ester 1 and ethanol was allowed to react with PC13 in anhydrous benzene. After workup, the cyclic hydrogen phosphite was treated with sulfur/triethylamine (3, 4) to give the pair of diastereoisomers 2. On treatment with aqueous triethylamine these compounds were converted into the diastereoisomers of the cyclic 2,3-phosphorothioate of D-glycerate (3a and 3b) in 48% yield from 1. (The methyl ester hydrolyzes under these mild conditions, presumably catalyzed by the neighboring phosphorothioate.) The diastereoisomers of 3a and 3b were separated by careful ion-exchange chromatography on DEAE-cellulose; each diastereoisomer was isolated in greater than 98% purity. This separation was conveniently monitored by gas chromatography of the trimethylsilyl derivatives.Hydrolytic ring opening of an isolated diastereoisomer of 3 (whether the diastereoisomer used was actually 3a or 3b is unknown, but for the purposes of illustration, Fig. 2 shows 3a) by Li18OH [approximately 1 M, prepared from metallic lithium and H2180 (97.3% atom excess 180)] at room temperature for 3 hr yielded a mixture of the 2-and 3-phosphorothioates of D-glycerate (4 and 5) in 75:25 ratio, as estimated by gas chromatography of the trimethylsilyl derivatives. This mixture was subjected to the following conversions (see Fig. 3).Route z. Treatment of the mixture (of 4 and 5) with sodium acetate buffer at pH 5.4 caused the preferential loss of sulfur ...