PUBLICATION

Analysis of the mast cell expressed carboxypeptidase A3 and its structural and evolutionary relationship to other vertebrate carboxypeptidases

Authors
Akula, S., Hellman, L., Avilés, F.X., Wernersson, S.
ID
ZDB-PUB-211008-6
Date
2021
Source
Developmental and comparative immunology   127: 104273 (Journal)
Registered Authors
Keywords
Carboxypeptidase, Evolution, Granule proteases, Mast cells
MeSH Terms
  • Animals
  • Carboxypeptidases/chemistry
  • Carboxypeptidases/genetics
  • Carboxypeptidases A/genetics
  • Carboxypeptidases A/metabolism
  • Mammals
  • Mast Cells*
  • Phylogeny
  • Zebrafish*/metabolism
PubMed
34619175 Full text @ Dev. Comp. Immunol.
Abstract
Metallo-carboxypeptidases are exopeptidases with diverse expression and function, found in all kingdoms of life from bacteria to mammals. One of them, the carboxypeptidase A3 (CPA3), has become an important component of the mammalian immune system by its expression in mast cells. Mast cells (MCs) are highly specialized sentinel cells, which store large amounts of bioactive mediators, including CPA3, in very abundant cytoplasmic granules. Clinical studies have found an increased CPA3 expression in asthma but the physiological role as well as the evolutionary origin of CPA3 remains largely unexplored. CPA3 belongs to the M14A subfamily of metallo-carboxypeptidases, which among others also includes the digestive enzymes CPA1, CPA2, CPB1 and CPO. To study the appearance of CPA3 during vertebrate evolution, we here performed bioinformatic analyses of homologous genes and gene loci from a broad panel of metazoan animals from invertebrates to mammals. The phylogenetic analysis indicated that CPA3 appeared at the base of tetrapod evolution in a branch closer to CPB1 than to other CPAs. Indeed, CPA3 and CPB1 are also located in the same locus, on chromosome 3 in humans. The presence of CPA3 only in tetrapods and not in fishes, suggested that CPA3 could have appeared by a gene duplication from CPB1 during early tetrapod evolution. However, the apparent loss of CPA3 in several tetrapod lineages, e.g. in birds and monotremes, indicates a complex evolution of the CPA3 gene. Interestingly, in the lack of CPA3 in fishes, zebrafish MCs express instead CPA5 for which the most closely related human carboxypeptidase is CPA1, which has a similar cleavage specificity as CPA3. Collectively, these findings clarify and add to our understanding of the evolution of hematopoietic proteases expressed by mast cells.
Genes / Markers
Figures
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Expression
Phenotype
Mutations / Transgenics
Human Disease / Model
Sequence Targeting Reagents
Fish
Antibodies
Orthology
Engineered Foreign Genes
Mapping