Bovine inositol monophosphatase. Ligand binding to pyrene-maleimide-labelled enzyme.

Inositol monophosphatase can be modified at two sites by pyrene maleimide. These sites have been identified as Cys141 and Cys218. Stoichiometric addition of pyrene maleimide allows the sole modification of Cys218. The fluorescence of the pyrene moiety on the modified protein can be excited directly or by resonance energy transfer. The fluorescence properties of the pyrene group on Cys218 allows the interaction of ligands with the enzyme to be monitored. This feature has allowed dissociation constants for various metal ions to be determined and allowed the formation of various enzyme/ligand complexes to be observed. These studies have demonstrated that Mg2+ is required to support Pi binding and that Li+ interacts with a post-catalytic complex which is only formed in the forward reaction.