Protease C1, an enzyme from soybean (Glycine max [L.] Merrill cv Amsoy 71) seedling cotyledons, was previously determined to be the enzyme responsible for the initial degradation of the a' and a subunits, but not the 8 subunit, of 8-conglycinin storage protein.l h e sizes of the proteolytic products generated by the action of protease C1 suggest that the cleavage sites on the a' and a subunits of j3-conglycinin may be located in their N-terminal domain, which is not found in the j3 subunit of 8-conglycinin. To check this hypothesis, storage proteins from other plant species that are homologous to either the a'/a or the j3 subunit of j3-conglycinin were tested as substrates. As expected, the convicilin from pea (Pisum sativum), a protein homologous to the a ' and a subunits of 8-conglycinin, was digested by protease C1. l h e vicilins from pea as well as vicilins from adzuki bean (Vigna angularis), garden bean (Phaseolus vulgaris), black-eyed pea (Vigna unguiculata), and mung bean (Vigna radiata), storage proteins that are homologous to the 19 subunit of soybean 8-conglycinin, were not degraded by protease C1. Degradation of soybean 8-conglycinin involves a sequential attack of the a subunit at multiple sites, culminating in the formation of a stable intermediate of 53.5 kD and a final product of 48.0 kD. The cleavage sites resulting in this formation of the intermediates and final product were determined by Nterminal analysis. lhese were compared to the known amino acid sequences of the three j3-conglycinin subunits. Results showed these two polypeptides to be generated by proteolysis of the a subunit at regions bearing long strings of acidic amino acid residues.Proteolysis of seed storage protein is a crucial process during early growth because it provides the seedling with amino acids until the seed becomes fully autotrophic. Soybean seeds (Glycine max) contain large amounts of storage proteins, particularly of glycinin and P-conglycinin. Glycinin has six subunits, each consisting of an acidic and a basic polypeptide linked by a single disulfide bond (Nielsen, 1985). 0-Conglycinin is composed of three subunits, a', a, and 0, associated in various combinations by noncovalent interactions Shibasaki, 1977, 1978). The greatest difference in the amino acid sequences of the three subunits of 8-conglycinin is in a segment of 179 amino acids at the N terminus of both the a' and the a subunits that is lacking in the / 3 subunit (Sebastiani et al., 1990). During early growth, Supported by National Science Foundation grants PCM 8301202Present address: Department of Food Science, Rutgers University, and DCB 9017420.
Newark, NJ.* Corresponding author; fax 1-607-777-6521.
127these proteins have been shown to undergo limited proteolysis, yielding discrete intermediates. The limited proteolysis is subsequently followed by more extensive and rapid degradation of those intermediates (Wilson et al., 1986). We have previously described the purification and characterization of a soybean Ser protease, protease C1, which catalyze...