Mechanism of the stimulatory effect of native fucoidan, highly sulfated fucoidan and heparin on plasminogen activation by tissue plasminogen activator: the role of chloride.

Native Fucoidan and unfractionated heparin enhanced by 6-fold the in vitro activation of human glutamic plasminogen (Glu-Plg) by tissue plasminogen activator (t-PA) using 0.05M Tris buffer pH 7.4, while sulfated fucoidan inhibited the activation under these conditions. Double reciprocal plots of these interactions showed that sulfated fucoidan inhibited the activation in a noncompetitive manner while the enhancements by heparin or native fucoidan were due to an increase of Vmax without affecting Km. To determine whether the stimulatory effect of the individual cofactor was due to its interaction with Glu-Plg or with t-PA, experiments were performed at a fixed level of the cofactor and either varying in a serial fashion the concentration of Glu-Plg or of t-PA. The ratios of the initial rate of plasmin generation in the presence or absence of the cofactors were plotted against the inverse of the volume fraction of Glu-Plg or of t-PA. The results showed that heparin interacted with Glu-Plg while native fucoidan and sulfated fucoidan interacted with t-PA. Studies were also conducted on the effect of the two fucoidans and heparin on the activation of Glu-Plg by t-PA using 0.05M Tris buffer pH 7.4 containing 0.1 M NaCl. Under these conditions, sulfated fucoidan was most effective in enhancing the activation followed by native fucoidan and heparin respectively. The results of this study showed that in presence of the buffer containing 0.1 M NaCl, heparin was interacting with t-PA while the two fucoidans were interacting with both t-PA and Glu-Plg. A comparison of the double reciprocal plots of the rate of enhancement by the cofactors using 0.05M Tris buffer pH 7.4 containing 0.1M NaCl or in presence of buffer alone showed that the cofactors were more effective using 0.05M Tris buffer pH 7.4 alone and that addition of NaCl to the buffer slowed down the reactions by decreasing Vmax without affecting Km. Circular Dichroism (CD) studies of Glu-Plg in the far ultraviolet (UV) range showed that addition of NaCl destabilized the beta sheet structure which was reversed by addition of 6-aminohexanoic acid (6-AH) or one of the cofactors, while the near UV CD spectra of Glu-Plg in presence of 0.1 M NaCl was enhanced by the cofactors by increasing its ellipticity as reported earlier for 6-AH.