Plant Physiol. (1999) 120: 961-968
Delivery of a Secreted Soluble Protein to the Vacuole via a
Membrane Anchor1
François Barrieu and
Maarten J. Chrispeels*
Department of Biology, University of California at San Diego, La
Jolla, California 92093-0116
 |
ABSTRACT |
To further understand how membrane
proteins are sorted in the secretory system, we devised a strategy that
involves the expression of a membrane-anchored yeast invertase in
transgenic plants. The construct consisted of a signal peptide followed
by the coding region of yeast invertase and the transmembrane domain
and cytoplasmic tail of calnexin. The substitution of a lysine near the
C terminus of calnexin with a glutamic acid residue ensured progression
through the secretory system rather than retention in or return to the endoplasmic reticulum. In the transformed plants, invertase activity and a 70-kD cross-reacting protein were found in the vacuoles. This
yeast invertase had plant-specific complex glycans, indicating that
transport to the vacuole was mediated by the Golgi apparatus. The
microsomal fraction contained a membrane-anchored 90-kD cross-reacting polypeptide, but was devoid of invertase activity. Our results indicate
that this membrane-anchored protein proceeds in the secretory system
beyond the point where soluble proteins are sorted for secretion, and
is detached from its membrane anchor either just before or just after
delivery to the vacuole.
 |
INTRODUCTION |
The endomembrane system of plant cells consists of a series of
compartments and membrane systems, each with unique proteins, and
shuttle vesicles that transport proteins and lipids from one compartment to another. The correct delivery of a protein to a particular compartment depends on information within the protein itself
(sorting signals) and on transport machinery that interacts with this
information. The sorting signals specify retention in a particular
compartment or sorting to the appropriate compartment. Considerable
progress has been made in recent years in understanding the sorting
signals on soluble proteins and the cellular machinery needed for
correct delivery of these proteins to various cellular destinations.
For example, when a retention or sorting signal is removed, the protein
still enters the secretory pathway as long as it has a signal peptide,
but is then secreted from the cells. Thus, transport to the vacuole
requires positive sorting information (Dorel et al., 1989
; for reviews,
see Neuhaus and Rogers, 1998
; Raikhel and Vitale, 1999
).
There is considerably less information about the sorting of integral
membrane proteins with transmembrane domains. Such proteins may enter
the secretory system because they have a cleavable signal peptide (like
soluble proteins) followed by a transmembrane domain that acts as a
stop-transfer signal, or they may become integrated into the membrane
because of the presence of one or more internal transmembrane domains
that act as uncleaved signal peptides and stop-transfer signals. For
plants, there is essentially no information about the domains or motifs
of integral membrane proteins that specifies their targeting or
retention. With respect to targeting, we need to understand why certain
proteins proceed from the ER (their point of entry) to the plasma
membrane, whereas others go to the tonoplast. This is particularly
relevant in the case of homologous proteins such as aquaporins, which
are found in both membranes. Although amino acid sequence comparisons
have revealed differences between the aquaporin homologs (Schaffner, 1998
), it is not clear that these domains contain the targeting information. The issue is further complicated by the presence of more
than one type of vacuole in plant cells (Paris et al., 1996
; Swanson et
al., 1998
).
For soluble proteins, it has been shown that the critical sorting event
occurs in the TGN, and that secretion is a default destination, whereas
transport to the vacuole requires positive sorting information. In the
yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae, the vacuolar membrane
appears to be the default destination of integral membrane proteins
(Roberts et al., 1992
; Gaynor et al., 1994
; Chang and Fink, 1995
;
Roberg et al., 1997
). Our previous attempt to answer the default
question for plant integral membrane proteins (Höfte and
Chrispeels, 1992
) did not yield an unequivocal answer. We found that a
reporter protein attached to the sixth transmembrane domain of a
tonoplast aquaporin was delivered to the tonoplast, but we could not be
sure that this transmembrane domain was devoid of any tonoplast
targeting information, because it was derived from a tonoplast protein.
A similar experiment was recently carried out by Jiang and Rogers
(1998)
, who used a mutated form of barley pro-aleurain as the reporter
protein and the transmembrane domain of the vacuolar sorting receptor
BP80 together with the cytoplasmic C-terminal tails of two different
TIPs (
-TIP and
-TIP). These cytoplasmic tails caused targeting to
different post-Golgi compartments.
In the present study we examine a related question: Can a protein that
is normally secreted
in this case yeast invertase
be delivered to the
vacuole if it is membrane anchored? We chose yeast invertase because it
is known not to have plant vacuolar targeting information. When yeast
invertase is equipped with a plant signal peptide, catalytically active
protein is secreted in the apoplast (von Schaewen et al., 1990
;
Dickinson et al., 1991
). We chose the transmembrane domain of yeast
calnexin because we assumed that this domain would not have information
for targeting to the plant tonoplast. Our results show that soluble
invertase accumulated in the vacuoles of transformed tobacco
(Nicotiana tabacum) plants, suggesting that
membrane-anchored invertase was transported to a destination beyond the
point where soluble proteins are sorted for secretion, possibly to a
PVC or to the vacuole itself, before it was detached from its membrane
anchor.
 |
MATERIALS AND METHODS |
Reagents
Restriction and DNA modification enzymes were obtained from New
England Biolabs. Pfu DNA polymerase was purchased from
Stratagene. Unless otherwise stated, all other chemicals were obtained
from Sigma.
Plasmid Construction
The 5
-GACTGGTACCCTAGAGTTTG-3
and 3
-GATCATATACAAAAGTATAGG-5
primers were used for PCR amplification of the 3
region of the plasmid
pEG-1-QK (Fig. 1) (Gaynor et al., 1994
).
The PCR product obtained was digested by KpnI and introduced
as an KpnI/SmaI fragment into a plant expression
cassette containing the CaMV 35S promoter and the polyadenylation
signal of the OCS (octopine synthase) gene. This construct
was then digested with KpnI to allow the insertion of the
KpnI/KpnI fragment of the PI-3-Inv plasmid (von Schaewen et al., 1990
) corresponding to the signal peptide of the
proteinase inhibitor II gene from potato (Keil et al., 1986
) and the
remaining part of the Suc 2 gene (Fig. 1) (Johnson et al., 1987
). The
constructs were finally cloned into a binary vector (PDE 1001, Plant
Genetic Systems, Ghent, Belgium) as
EcoRI/HindIII fragments, and directly transformed
into Agrobacterium tumefaciens strain C58 AGL-0 (Lazo et
al., 1991
).
Transformation and Regeneration of Transgenic Plants
Leaf discs of tobacco (Nicotiana tabacum cv Xanthi)
were transformed as described by Voelker et al. (1989)
. Transformed
plants were grown in tissue culture under a 16-h light/8-h dark regime on Murashige and Skoog medium (Murashige and Skoog, 1962
) containing 3% (w/w) Suc and 100 µg/mL kanamycin. The kanamycin-resistant plants
were transferred to soil (Special Blend, Sun Gro Horticulture, Bellevue, WA) and grown in individual pots in a growth chamber under a
16-h light/8-h dark regime. Leaves were collected for invertase
activity analysis and the highest expressors were used for further
analysis.
Detection of Invertase Activity in Native Polyacrylamide Gels
Yeast invertase activity in leaves of transformed tobacco plants
was detected using a native invertase activity gel assay (Gabriel and
Wang, 1969
). Triton X-100 (final concentration 0.1% [v/v]) was added
to aliquots of protein extracts before loading on a 10% polyacrylamide
gel; the gel and running buffers were 100 mM
Tris-phosphate, pH 6.7. After running overnight at 40 V and 4°C, gels
were incubated in an acidic Suc solution (0.1 M Suc and 0.1 M NaOAc, pH 5) for 30 min at 30°C. Following a brief wash
in distilled water, gels were developed by incubation in a boiling
solution of 0.5 M NaOH containing 0.1% (w/v)
2,3,5-triphenyltetrazolium chloride, giving rise to red bands at
positions of invertase activity.
Protein Extraction and Preparation of Soluble and
Microsomal Fractions
Total protein extracts were obtained by homogenizing
tobacco leaves (500 mg) in 2 mL of cold extraction buffer (50 mM Tris-phosphate, pH 6.7, 1% [v/v]
-mercaptoethanol,
12% [w/w] Suc, 0.2 mM aminoethylbenzene-sulfonylfluoride [Calbiochem-Novabiochem], 2 µg/mL aprotinin, and 1 µg/mL leupeptin) and collecting the supernatant after centrifugation
at 10,000g for 10 min. The homogenate was then fractionated
into a soluble and crude microsomal fraction by centrifugation at
100,000g for 1 h through a cushion of extraction buffer
containing 16% (w/w) Suc. The upper phase, containing the soluble
proteins, was collected and is referred to as the soluble fraction. The
microsomal pellet was resuspended in extraction buffer.
Immunoprecipitation, SDS-PAGE, and Immunoblotting
Immunoprecipitation experiments were carried out as described by
Faye and Chrispeels (1989)
. SDS-PAGE was performed on 15% (w/v)
polyacrylamide slab gels according to the method of Laemmli (1970)
.
Proteins separated by SDS-PAGE were transferred to nitrocellulose membranes (Micron Separations, Westborough, MA) according to the method
of Faye and Chrispeels (1985)
. Immunodetection was carried out
essentially as described by Laurière et al. (1989)
, except that
the yeast invertase and BiP antisera were diluted 1:1,000 with 0.05%
(v/v) Tween 20 in TBS (20 mM Tris-HCl, pH 7.5, and 500 mM NaCl).
Isolation of Protoplasts and Vacuoles
Protoplast and vacuole isolation from whole tobacco leaf tissue
was carried out as described by Dombrowski et al. (1994)
. The purity
and integrity of the vacuoles were monitored microscopically. To
compare invertase activity in protoplasts and in the vacuolar fraction,
equal
-mannosidase activities, determined according to the method of
Van der Wilden et al. (1980)
, were subjected to PAGE and stained for
invertase activity as described above.
 |
RESULTS |
Construction of a Membrane-Anchored Chimeric Yeast Invertase Gene
A chimeric gene that encodes a membrane-anchored invertase that
would enter the secretory system so that the path of the invertase protein in the cell could be followed contained the following parts:
the signal peptide of the potato PR1 protein fused in frame to the
coding sequence of yeast invertase, which was fused in frame to the
transmembrane domain, followed by the short C-terminal cytoplasmic tail
of yeast calnexin (see ``Materials and Methods'' and Fig. 1 for
details). The derived amino acid sequence of this construct and the
accompanying hydropathy plot (Fig. 2)
reveal the presence of two hydrophobic domains. We reasoned that the
signal peptide would allow the nascent polypeptide to enter the protein
into the ER lumen, and that the transmembrane domain of calnexin would
act as a stop-transfer sequence, creating a type I membrane protein
with a large luminal domain and a short cytoplasmic tail.

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| Figure 2.
Amino acid sequence and derived hydropathy plot of
the membrane-anchored chimeric yeast invertase. A, Amino acid sequence
of the fusion protein. The single-letter amino acid code is used. The
signal peptide of the potato PR1 protein is represented in italics. The
transmembrane domain of the yeast calnexin Wbp1 is underlined. Putative
N-glycosylation sites are bolded. B, Hydropathy plot of
the fusion protein. The plot was generated using a moving window of 11 residues (Kyte and Doolittle, 1982 ).
|
|
There is considerable evidence in yeast that KKXX motifs on the
cytosolic tails of transmembrane proteins can act as ER retention signals (Gaynor et al., 1994
; Letourneur et al., 1994
). Although there
is as yet (to our knowledge) no good evidence for plant cells regarding
the retention function of this motif, we mutated the KKTN C terminus to
QKTN by site-directed mutagenesis to eliminate this retention
possibility. The construct was fused to the CaMV 35S promoter and
introduced into tobacco via A. tumefaciens-mediated transformation. We recovered a dozen transgenic plants and all showed
the typical "stress" phenotype previously observed in tobacco plants expressing yeast invertase in their leaves: There were large
yellow and brown sectors between the major veins and these sectors
turned necrotic as the leaves matured (see also von Schaewen et al.,
1990
; Dickinson et al., 1991
). The subcellular distribution of yeast
invertase activity and protein was examined in these transgenic plants.
Yeast Invertase Activity Is Found in Vacuoles
We used a combination of activity gels and subcellular
fractionation to determine the location of the yeast invertase activity within the cells. In the type of gels used here, plant extracts do not
give a reaction product, possibly because the invertase is inactivated
in the heating step (see also Dickinson et al., 1991
), but the
thermostable yeast invertase yields the red reaction product of the
tetrazolium reaction that uses oxidized Glc as its substrate (see
``Materials and Methods''). Leaves of young plants were homogenized in buffered 12% (w/w) Suc, and the homogenate was fractionated into a
soluble and crude microsomal fraction by centrifuging the microsomes
through a 16% Suc layer to free them of soluble proteins. Invertase
activity gels showed that there was considerable invertase activity in
the soluble fraction but no activity in the microsomal fraction (Fig.
3A, lanes 3 and 4). In some experiments
we found traces of yeast invertase in the microsomal fraction of the
transformed plants, but this may have been caused by contamination from
the soluble fraction.

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| Figure 3.
Detection of invertase activity in transgenic
plants. A, Proteins from soluble (S, lanes 1 and 3) and microsomal (M,
lanes 2 and 4) fractions of wild-type (WT) and transgenic (INV) leaves
of transgenic plants were prepared as described in ``Materials and Methods'' and assayed for invertase activity after gel
electrophoresis. Yeast invertase activity was detected only in the
soluble fraction of transgenic plants. No invertase activity was
detected in the soluble or microsomal fractions from wild-type plants.
B, Detection of invertase activity in protoplasts (lane P) and vacuoles
(lane V) of transgenic plants. Vacuoles were isolated from leaf
protoplasts of transgenic plants and assayed for -mannosidase
activity. The invertase activity in the vacuole (lane 2) was compared
with the invertase activity present in intact protoplasts (lane 1)
after loading the same amount of -mannosidase activity onto each
lane.
|
|
The presence of a plant signal peptide on yeast invertase causes the
enzyme to be secreted in the apoplast of transgenic plants (von
Schaewen et al., 1990
; Dickinson et al., 1991
). We therefore checked
whether the soluble enzyme might represent enzyme extracted from the
cell wall during homogenization of the leaves. We prepared extracellular fluid from leaf tissue samples according to the method of
Klement (1965)
, but found that it contained no yeast invertase (data
not shown), whereas isolated protoplasts contained abundant amounts of
soluble yeast invertase. To determine if the soluble invertase was
located in the vacuoles, we isolated vacuoles by gentle lysis of leaf
protoplasts obtained from the transformed plants. These vacuole
fractions are generally free of contaminating organelles. Both the
protoplast and the vacuole fraction were assayed for the vacuolar
marker enzyme
-mannosidase. Lanes 1 and 2 of the gel, shown in
Figure 3B, were loaded with aliquots containing equal amounts of
-mannosidase activity. Visualization of the invertase activity in
this gel showed that the two lanes contained roughly the same amount of
invertase, suggesting that the soluble yeast invertase activity is in
the vacuoles.
These results lead to the conclusion that an enzyme that would normally
be secreted because of the presence of a signal peptide and the lack of
vacuolar targeting determinants can be delivered to the vacuole if the
protein is synthesized in a membrane-attached form. In the present
study, the membrane attachment was apparently disrupted by proteolysis
either along the secretory pathway or in the vacuole. In any case,
invertase remained membrane attached beyond the point where soluble
proteins without vacuolar signals are packaged for secretion.
Microsomes Contain a Membrane-Anchored 90-kD Invertase
Cross-Reacting Polypeptide
The absence of invertase activity from the microsomes was a
puzzling finding, because a protein that enters the secretory system
would be expected to be found there as well as at its final destination. We used an antiserum to yeast invertase to locate cross-reacting polypeptides in the soluble and microsomal fractions of
the transformed plants on an immunoblot. The results (Fig. 4) show that the soluble fraction
contained a 70-kD species and the microsomal fraction contained a 90-kD
species. The 70-kD size is commensurate with glycosylated mature
invertase, since the polypeptide itself is 58 kD and there are 10 glycosylation sites. The 90-kD size is commensurate with the
glycosylated translation product of the chimeric invertase gene.

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| Figure 4.
Immunodetection of yeast invertase in protein
extracts from transgenic plants. Proteins from soluble (S, lanes 1 and
3) and microsomal (M, lanes 2 and 4) fractions of wild-type (WT) and
transgenic (INV) plants were fractionated by SDS-PAGE, electroblotted
onto nitrocellulose membrane, and probed with a yeast invertase
antiserum. Molecular standards are shown on the left (in kD).
|
|
The microsomes were subjected to five cycles of freezing and thawing,
and the membranes were sedimented again by centrifugation. A comparison
of the polypeptides present in the membranes and the supernatant by
immunoblotting with yeast invertase and BiP antisera showed that the
90-kD polypeptide was not released by freezing and thawing of the
microsomal vesicles, although a substantial portion of the soluble
ER-resident BiP was released by this procedure (Fig.
5). Similar results were obtained when
the vesicles were treated with 0.03% Triton X-100, a concentration of
detergent known to release soluble microsomal proteins (Kreibich et
al., 1973
; Van der Wilden et al., 1980
). We interpret these data to mean that the microsomes contain a 90-kD species of invertase that has
no catalytic activity. Detachment of the enzyme from its membrane
anchor apparently allows the enzyme to be active.

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| Figure 5.
Immunodetection of yeast invertase in microsomes
of transgenic plants. A microsomal extract prepared from leaves of
transgenic plants was subjected to five freeze-thaw cycles. After
centrifugation at 100,000g for 1 h, proteins from
the supernatant (soluble microsomal proteins, lane 3), the pellet
(microsomal membrane proteins, lane 2) and the original total microsome
fraction (lane 1) were separated by SDS-PAGE and blotted onto a
nitrocellulose membrane. A, Immunodetection of yeast invertase. B,
Immunodetection of BiP using a serum against tomato BiP. Molecular
standards (in kD) are shown on the right.
|
|
Transport to the Vacuole Is Mediated by the Golgi Apparatus
There is some evidence that there are multiple pathways to the
vacuole in plant cells, one of which may bypass the Golgi apparatus (for review, see Okita and Rogers, 1996
; Beevers and Raikhel, 1998
;
Robinson et al., 1998
). Modification of Asn-linked high-Man glycans by
Golgi-located glycosidases and glycosyltransferases is diagnostic of
protein transport mediated by the Golgi apparatus. Through the action
of these Golgi enzymes these glycans become "complex" with
-1,3
Fuc and
-1,2 Xyl residues. The presence of such residues can be
detected with a complex, glycan-specific antiserum (Laurière et
al., 1989
).
To find out if the soluble invertase in the vacuole contained such
glycans, we immunoprecipitated invertase in the soluble fraction of the
homogenate with anti-invertase antibodies and protein A-Sepharose beads
and then used the precipitated polypeptides for an immunoblot with the
complex glycan antiserum. The results show that a 70-kD polypeptide
precipitated by the invertase serum reacted strongly with the
anti-complex glycan serum (Fig. 6). This
means that the soluble vacuolar invertase acquired complex glycans on
its way to the vacuole, and suggests that vacuolar transport is Golgi
mediated. The 60-kD cross-reacting polypeptide seen in lane 2 of Figure
6 is also present in lane 1, which contains proteins from the control
plants, and therefore does not represent a yeast invertase polypeptide.
It is likely that this polypeptide represents a component of the serum
used for immunoprecipitation, which reacts with the secondary
antibodies used for the immunoblot (see ``Materials and Methods'').

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| Figure 6.
Immunoblot analysis of proteins from the soluble
fractions of wild-type and transgenic plants. Proteins from the soluble
fractions of wild-type (WT, lane 1) and transgenic (INV, lane 2) plants
were selectively immunoprecipitated using the yeast invertase
antiserum, separated by SDS-PAGE, electroblotted onto nitrocellulose
membrane, and probed with a plant complex glycan antiserum (Lauriere et
al., 1989). Molecular standards are shown on the left (in kD).
|
|
 |
DISCUSSION |
The results presented in this paper support the interpretation
that a soluble protein that would normally be secreted after it enters
the secretory system can be delivered to the vacuole if the protein is
synthesized in a membrane-attached configuration. The reason for
vacuolar delivery is still unclear, but two interpretations are
possible: Either the tonoplast is the default destination of a
membrane-attached protein or, after this particular protein is detached
from its anchor, it contains sufficient vacuolar targeting information
to target it to the vacuole. If the first interpretation is correct
then plants resemble the yeast S. cerevisiae, in which the
vacuolar membrane is the default destination for membrane proteins, and
are unlike mammalian cells in that sorting of lysosomal membrane
proteins requires positive sorting information whereas sorting to the
plasma membrane does not.
Sorting Vacuolar/Lysosomal Membrane Proteins in Mammals, Yeasts,
and Plants
In mammalian cells, lysosomal membrane proteins can reach their
destination by two routes: a direct route from the Golgi, possibly via
a prelysosomal or endosomal compartment that requires information in
the C-terminal cytoplasmic domain of the protein, or indirectly, after
first being transported to the plasma membrane along the default
pathway and then being retrieved by virtue of the presence of a
specific sorting signal (for review, see Hunziker and Geuze, 1996
).
Roberts et al. (1992)
examined the targeting of two integral membrane
dipeptidylaminopeptidases in yeast, DPAP-A and DPAP-B, which reside in
the Golgi apparatus and the vacuolar membrane, respectively. They
carried out domain swaps with the two proteins and found that all their
results were consistent with a model in which proteins are delivered to
the vacuolar membrane along a default pathway. All subsequent studies
have confirmed this interpretation.
In plants, there is little information about the targeting of integral
membrane proteins, and there are no studies that attempt to answer this
question specifically. In two previous studies (Höfte and
Chrispeels, 1992
; Jiang and Rogers, 1998
), a soluble reporter protein
was fused to a membrane anchor derived from
-TIP, and the soluble
protein was found in the vacuoles of the transformed plants expressing
this construct. The interpretation may be complicated by the recent
finding that some plant cells contain at least two types of vacuoles
(Paris et al., 1996
; Neuhaus and Rogers, 1998
; Swanson et al., 1998
).
In young seedlings that are digesting stored reserves, both the storage
parenchyma cells and the meristematic cells contain protein storage
vacuoles as well as lytic vacuoles. The tonoplasts of these vacuoles
have their own specific integral TIPs:
-TIP in the protein storage
vacuoles and
-TIP in the lytic vacuoles. The presence of different
types of vacuoles with their own tonoplast proteins would require
specific targeting information for at least one of these. Jiang and
Rogers (1998)
recently showed differential targeting of a
membrane-anchored proaleurain when the C-terminal cytoplasmic tails of
these two TIPs were used. However, when expressing
-TIP in tobacco
leaves, we found that it was targeted to the tonoplasts of lytic
vacuoles (Höfte and Chrispeels, 1992
). It is not clear whether
-TIP has specific targeting information for the tonoplast of protein
storage vacuoles. However, when these vacuoles are absent, as we
presume they are in tobacco leaves,
-TIP goes to the tonoplast of
the lytic vacuole. This is consistent with the lytic vacuole as a
default destination.
Membrane-Anchored Invertase Proceeds Beyond the TGN
By equipping yeast invertase with a plant signal peptide derived
from potato proteinase inhibitor 2, we ensured the entry of invertase
into the secretory system. Indeed, when such a construct is expressed
in transgenic tobacco plants the yeast invertase is secreted into the
apoplast (von Schaewen et al., 1990
; Dickinson et al., 1991
). Fusion
with a transmembrane domain at the C terminus normally ensures that
this transmembrane domain acts as a stop-transfer sequence so that the
invertase itself is anchored to the membrane on the luminal side of the
cisterna. We chose the transmembrane domain of yeast calnexin on the
assumption that this long (32-amino acid) transmembrane domain would
not cause retention along the transport path. In yeast and mammalian
cells, proteins with short transmembrane domains (16-18 amino acids)
are retained in the ER and Golgi, whereas proteins with longer domains
are allowed to proceed to the plasma membrane or vacuolar membrane
unless they have other retention information (Munro, 1995
; Rayner and Pelham, 1997
). Changing the C terminus from KKTN to QKTN should have
abolished any ER retention information if the same motif that is active
in yeast and mammalian cells is also active in plant cells (Jackson et
al., 1990
; Gaynor et al., 1994
). Progression through the secretory
system would eventually allow this invertase to accumulate inside the
tonoplast or outside the plasma membrane. Detachment of the invertase
would result in free invertase in the vacuole or the apoplast. The
results presented here (Fig. 3B) show quite clearly that the invertase
was all in the vacuoles.
The absence of active invertase from the microsomal fraction raises the
possibility that membrane-anchored invertase may not be active, because
we certainly would expect to find invertase protein in the ER and Golgi
fractions. We confirmed that this was indeed the case, and a 90-kD
cross-reacting polypeptide was found in the microsomal fraction. A size
of 90 kD is consistent with a translation product of 632 amino acids
that has a Mr of 72,100 and the
presence of eight to 10 small glycans of 1,200 to 2,000 Mr depending on the degree of
processing (invertase has 10 possible glycosylation sites, see Fig.
2A). That this 90-kD form of invertase is indeed membrane anchored was
shown by freeze-thawing the microsomes repeatedly or by treating them
with 0.03% Triton X-100. Such treatments solubilize soluble ER
residents while still allowing the membrane proteins to be sedimented
(Kreibich et al., 1973
). This treatment solubilizes a considerable
amount of BiP, but much of it still sedimented with the permeabilized
vesicles (see Fig. 5). We postulate that this BiP is bound to proteins that are not yet completely folded and that it is therefore not readily
released from the vesicles. The release of BiP from unfolded or
not-yet-assembled proteins in the ER requires ATP (for review, see
Galili et al., 1998
). It is entirely possible that some part of this
chimeric invertase protein never folds quite "correctly" and that
BiP therefore remains attached to it until such time as soluble
invertase is released from its membrane anchor.
The presence of soluble invertase in the vacuole indicates that
invertase remained in the membrane-anchored form until it had been
sorted beyond the TGN, where sorting of secreted and vacuolar proteins
is thought to take place. Recent evidence obtained with soluble
proteins indicates that they are sorted by receptors (Ahmed et al.,
1997
; Paris et al., 1997
) and are postulated to pass through a PVC
between the TGN and the vacuole (Conceição et al., 1997
;
Sanderfoot et al., 1998
). Thus, detachment of invertase from its
membrane anchor may have occurred in the PVC or in the vacuole, and
this uncertainty is shown in the model depicted in Figure
7. The presence of proteases in the lytic
vacuoles of plant cells is well documented (Butcher et al., 1977
;
Boller and Kende, 1979
; and others subsequently), and these proteases
may also be active in the PVC. The fate of the transmembrane domain
after invertase detachment is not known, but it may be degraded by the proteolytic system that disposes of incomplete or improperly folded proteins (Pueyo et al., 1995
; Pedrazzini et al., 1997
).

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| Figure 7.
Schematic diagram showing protein sorting in the
secretory system. Membrane-anchored invertase reaches a compartment
beyond the TGN, such as the PVC or the vacuole itself, before it is
detached from the membrane. Whether invertase detachment from its
membrane anchor occurs in the PVC or in the vacuole is not known. ,
Invertase.
|
|
We do not know if the C terminus of the soluble invertase includes
amino acids that are not part of the yeast invertase translation product but came instead from the small luminal portion of calnexin used to make the fusion construct. We cannot rule out that invertase was detached earlier in the secretory pathway (in the TGN?) and that
these few (putative) amino acids constituted a vacuolar targeting signal on the detached invertase. The absence of soluble invertase from
the microsomes argues against this possibility, but the TGN and the PVC
may be very small compartments through which proteins pass rapidly. In
this case we would not expect a substantial amount of soluble invertase
in the microsomal fraction, even if it were detached in the PVC or TGN.
An antiserum to the membrane anchor may help resolve this issue, but
our attempts to do so were unsuccessful.
The scenario described above assumes that the transport of this
membrane-anchored protein went through the Golgi apparatus and that
sorting involved the TGN and the PVC. Based on ultrastructural evidence, a direct route from the ER to the vacuole has been proposed, at least in developing seeds that make copious quantities of vacuolar proteins (Hara-Nishimura et al., 1998
). This direct route differs from
the ER-derived protein bodies known to exist in the endosperm of maize
and other cereals. In wheat, such protein bodies are thought to enter
the vacuole through endocytosis (Levanony et al., 1992
).
Based on our finding that the soluble vacuolar invertase contains
complex glycans (with
-1,3 Fuc and/or
-1,2 Xyl) (Fig. 7), we can
conclude that the chimeric protein passed through the Golgi apparatus.
The presence of complex glycans on glycoproteins of animal and plant
cells is diagnostic of their passage through the Golgi apparatus. Jiang
and Rogers (1998)
used the same complex, glycan-specific antiserum to
conclude that membrane-anchored pro-aleurain accumulated in the
membranes of post-Golgi compartments.
A Membrane Anchor Provides a Novel Way to Deliver a Protein to the
Vacuole
Because the vacuole is the largest compartment of the plant cell,
it is an ideal compartment for the accumulation of proteins produced in
transgenic plants if those proteins are stable in the vacuolar
environment. The experiments reported here may represent a novel way to
deliver a protein to the vacuole. Until now, delivery to the vacuole
could only be ensured by the attachment of a vacuolar sorting signal at
the N terminus or the C terminus of a soluble protein that also carries
a signal peptide. The vacuolar accumulation of soluble invertase from a
membrane-anchored microsomal form, indicates that it may be possible to
deliver other enzymes to the vacuole in the same manner. It is
apparently not necessary to use the membrane anchor of a tonoplast
protein to obtain this result. Our experiments do not exclude the
possibility that the length of the transmembrane domain and the
characteristics of the amino acids play a role in the targeting of
integral membrane proteins in cells that have more than one type of
vacuole, and this issue needs to be further explored. It would also be
interesting to find out if enzymes that are membrane anchored in this
way are generally inactive until they are detached.
 |
FOOTNOTES |
1
This work was supported by a grant from the U.S.
Department of Energy, Energy Biosciences Program.
*
Corresponding author; e-mail mchrispeels{at}ucsd.edu; fax
619-534-4052.
Received February 8, 1999;
accepted May 10, 1999.
 |
ABBREVIATIONS |
Abbreviations:
BiP, binding protein.
PVC, pre-vacuolar
compartment.
TGN, trans-Golgi network.
TIP, tonoplast
intrinsic protein.
 |
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS |
We thank Rebecca Dyer and Bernard de la Cruz for their help in
making the initial constructs, Scott Emr (University of California, San
Diego) for kindly providing the yeast invertase antiserum, and Nigel
Crawford (University of California, San Diego) for the gift of the
A. tumefaciens strain.
 |
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