Comparison of the primary structures of acidic proteinases and of their zymogens.

From the scattered information about primary structures of aspartate proteinases the following general features appear: 1) Sequence determinations show that two catalytically active aspartic acid residues are located in highly conservative surroundings. 2) Zymogens have so far only been found for extracellular aspartate proteinases of the vertebrates. The zymogens from the gastric mucosa are converted into active enzymes by a limited proteolysis releasing 42 to 44 residues from the NH2-terminus. A common pattern of basic and apolar residues is observed in this NH2-terminal segment. 3) In the presently known structures gastric proteinases and their zymogens have about 40% of all residues in common. The sequence of penicillopepsin shows 18% of identity with the gastric proteinases.