Synthetic peptides corresponding to the site phosphorylated in 6-phosphofructo-2-kinase/fructose-2,6-bisphosphatase as substrates of cyclic nucleotide-dependent protein kinases.

The specificities of cAMP-dependent and cGMP-dependent protein kinases were studied using synthetic peptides corresponding to the phosphorylation site in 6-phosphofructo-2-kinase/Fru-2,6-P2ase (Murray, K.J., El-Maghrabi, M.R., Kountz, P.D., Lukas, T.J., Soderling, T.R., and Pilkis, S.J. (1984) J. Biol. Chem. 259, 7673-7681) as substrates. The peptide Val-Leu-Gln-Arg-Arg-Arg-Gly-Ser-Ser-Ile-Pro-Gln was phosphorylated by the catalytic subunit of cAMP-dependent protein kinase on predominantly the first of its 2 seryl residues. The Km (4 microM) and Vmax (14 mumol/min/mg) values were comparable to those for the phosphorylation of this site within native 6-phosphofructo-2-kinase/Fru-2,6-P2ase. An analog peptide containing only two arginines was phosphorylated with poorer kinetic constants than was the parent peptide. These results suggest that the amino acid sequence at its site of phosphorylation is a major determinant that makes 6-phosphofructo-2-kinase/Fru-2,6-P2ase an excellent substrate for cAMP-dependent protein kinase. Although 6-phosphofructo-2-kinase/Fru-2,6-P2ase was not phosphorylated by cGMP-dependent protein kinase, the synthetic peptide corresponding to the cAMP-dependent phosphorylation site was a relatively good substrate (Km = 33 microM, Vmax = 1 mumol/min/mg). Thus, structures other than the primary sequence at the phosphorylation site must be responsible for the inability of cGMP-dependent protein kinase to phosphorylate native 6-phosphofructo-2-kinase/Fru-2,6-P2ase. Peptides containing either a -Ser-Ser- or -Thr-Ser- moiety were all phosphorylated by cGMP-dependent kinase to 1.0 mol of phosphate/mol of peptide, but the phosphate was distributed between the two hydroxyamino acids. Substitution of a proline in place of the glycine between the three arginines and these phosphorylatable amino acids caused the protein kinase selectively to phosphorylate the threonyl or first seryl residue and also enhanced the Vmax values by 4-6-fold. These results are consistent with a role for proline in allowing an adjacent threonyl residue to be readily phosphorylated by cGMP-dependent protein kinase.