Glycerol trinitrate (GTN) reductase, which enables Agrobacterium radiobacter to utilize GTN and related explosives as sources of nitrogen for growth, was purified and characterized, and its gene was cloned and sequenced. The enzyme was a 39-kDa monomeric protein which catalyzed the NADH-dependent reductive scission of GTN (K m ؍ 23 M) to glycerol dinitrates (mainly the 1,3-isomer) with a pH optimum of 6.5, a temperature optimum of 35°C, and no dependence on metal ions for activity. It was also active on pentaerythritol tetranitrate (PETN), on isosorbide dinitrate, and, very weakly, on ethyleneglycol dinitrate, but it was inactive on isopropyl nitrate, hexahydro-1,3,5-trinitro-1,3,5-triazine, 2,4,6-trinitrotoluene, ammonium ions, nitrate, or nitrite. The amino acid sequence deduced from the DNA sequence was homologous (42 to 51% identity and 61 to 69% similarity) to those of PETN reductase from Enterobacter cloacae, N-ethylmaleimide reductase from Escherichia coli, morphinone reductase from Pseudomonas putida, and old yellow enzyme from Saccharomyces cerevisiae, placing the GTN reductase in the ␣/ barrel flavoprotein group of proteins. GTN reductase and PETN reductase were very similar in many respects except in their distinct preferences for NADH and NADPH cofactors, respectively.Nitrate esters such as glycerol trinitrate (GTN) and pentaerythritol tetranitrate (PETN) are widely used both as explosives and as vasodilators in the treatment of angina. During their long history of exploitation in these applications (24, 34), there has been ample opportunity during production, storage, and use for significant contamination of land sites and water courses to occur, so that site remediation of explosive residues is now an urgent issue worldwide. Moreover, the current acceleration in demilitarization of ordnance and rocket formulations will produce further waste material, raising new environmental concerns. The environmental issues, together with the rarity of naturally occurring analogs (14), make the discovery of microorganisms which can degrade such compounds and thus influence their environmental fate of particular interest. Earlier interest in the elimination of nitrate ester explosives in wastewater treatment plants (35,36) and in their metabolism in fungal organisms (6,7,29,30) led to the first report (21) of denitration of GTN in pure bacterial cultures of Bacillus thuringiensis plus B. cereus and Enterobacter agglomerans, apparently occurring via a hydrolytic pathway, although formation of nitrate was not demonstrated. In contrast, White et al. showed unequivocally that assimilation of nitrogen from GTN in pure cultures of a Pseudomonas sp. (37) and Agrobacterium radiobacter (38) occurred via nitrite (not nitrate) with the concomitant formation of mainly glycerol 1,3-dinitrate (1,3-GDN) and small amounts of the corresponding 1,2-isomer. Cells were able to denitrate both of the dinitrates to mononitrates but not beyond, and they also converted PETN to its tri-and dinitrates. The enzyme responsible was identif...