The phospholipid-dependence of uridine diphosphate glucuronyltransferase. Temperature-dependence of microsomal enzyme activity and thermotropic changes in membrane structure.

Arrhenius plots of the non-latent UDP-glucuronyltransferase (p-nitrophenol acceptor) activity of guinea-pig microsomal membranes prepared with 154 mM-KCl were linear from 5 to 40 degrees C. Arrhenius plots for other microsomal preparations from guinea pig and rat liver that show various degrees of transferase latency, exhibited two linear regions intersecting at a sharp transition point near 20-25 degrees C. This discontinuity was abolished or greatly decreased when transferase latency was removed by treating the membranes with perturbants of phospholipid bilayer strucutre. The fluorescent probe N-phenyl-1-naphthyl-amine detected a thermotropic change in the fluidity of the phospholipid acyl chains of all the microsomal membrane preparations studied, at temperatures close to those of the Arrhenius-plot transitions. It is concluded that the thermotropic change in the structure of the membrane bilayer probably is a 'phase separation' or clustering of phospholipids, which affects a permeability barrier that restricts access of substrate to the transferase molecules.