In vitro and in vivo functional characterization of bovine vitamin K-dependent gamma-carboxylase expressed in Chinese hamster ovary cells.

Coagulation factor IX is a serine protease for which high-level expression of biologically active protein in heterologous cells is limited due to inefficient proteolytic removal of the propeptide as well as vitamin K-dependent carboxylation of multiple amino-terminal glutamic acid residues. We have overexpressed the vitamin K-dependent gamma-carboxylase cDNA and monitored its ability to improve factor IX processing in Chinese hamster ovary (CHO) cells. From amino acid sequence analysis of bovine liver vitamin K-dependent gamma-carboxylase, degenerate oligonucleotides were used to isolate a 3.5-kbp bovine cDNA that encoded a 758-residue open reading frame. Expression of the cDNA in COS-1 and CHO cells yielded 17- and 16-fold increases in the in vitro gamma-carboxylase activity of microsomal preparations, respectively. Anti-serum raised against a predicted peptide sequence reacted with a 94-kDa polypeptide in the partially purified bovine liver preparation as well as in stably transfected CHO cells. The amount of antibody reactivity correlated with the increased ability to carboxylate a peptide substrate in vitro. These results strongly support the conclusion that the cDNA encodes the vitamin K-dependent gamma-carboxylase. Transient transfection of the gamma-carboxylase expression vector into factor IX-expressing CHO cells did not improve the specific procoagulant activity of secreted factor IX. In contrast, transfection of an expression vector encoding the propeptide processing enzyme PACE (paired basic amino acid cleaving enzyme) did improve the specific activity of secreted factor IX by 3-fold. These results demonstrate that the ability of CHO cells to modify glutamic acid residues to gamma-carboxyglutamic acid in secreted factor IX is not limited by the expression of the vitamin K-dependent gamma-carboxylase alone.