UNAM
Revista Digital Universitaria
Revista Digital Universitaria ISSN: 1607 - 6079 | Publicación mensual | 1 de enero de 2015 vol.16, No.1

ABSTRACT

An unsuccessful experiment with excellent results: species-specific enzyme inactivation



Ruy Pérez Montfort


This article describes my recollections about an unsuccessful experiment made in 1992, which led to my collaboration of more than 20 years with Dr. Armando Gómez Puyou. Initially, it briefly describes some of the chemistry of protein iodination using chloramine–T. Then it describes the “Penefsky column” for the fast separation of large molecules (like proteins) from small molecules (like the reagents used in the iodination reaction). The unsuccessful experiment was that radioactive iodine did not bind to rabbit triosephosphate isomerase in the presence of chloramine –T. But Dr. Gómez Puyou noticed subsequently that chloramine-T strongly inactivated the enzymatic function of rabbit triosephosphate isomerase and inactivated the same enzyme from yeast considerably less. Our main common research project, which was the species-specific inactivation of triosephosphate isomerase, was born from this observation.



Keywords: Armando Gómez Puyou, triosephosphate isomerase, chloramine–T, Penefsky column, iodination, radioactivity, enzymatic activity, unsuccessful experiment