Multiple inhibitor analysis of the brequinar and leflunomide binding sites on human dihydroorotate dehydrogenase

Brequinar and the active metabolite of leflunomide, A77 1726, have been clearly shown to inhibit human dihydroorotate dehydrogenase (DHODH), but conflicting mechanisms for their inhibition have been reported. DHODH catalyses the conversion of dihydroorotate (DHO) to orotate concurrent with the reduction of ubiquinone. This study presents data that indicates brequinar is a competitive inhibitor versus ubiquinone; A77 1726 is noncompetitive versus ubiquinone and both are uncompetitive versus DHO. 2-Phenyl 5-quinolinecarboxylic acid (PQC), the core moiety of brequinar also shows competitive inhibition versus ubiquinone. Multiple inhibition experiments indicate that PQC (and thus brequinar) and A77 1726 have overlapping binding sites. Both PQC and A77 1726 are also mutually exclusive with barbituric acid (a competitive inhibitor versus DHO). In addition, we failed to observe brequinar binding to E.orotate by isothermal titration calorimetry (ITC). These results indicate that the E.DHO.inhibitor and E.orotate.inhibitor ternary complexes do not form. The absence of these complexes is consistent with the two-site ping-pong mechanism reported for DHODH. This kinetic data suggests that recent crystal structures of human DHODH complexed with orotate and A77 1726 or brequinar may not represent the relevant physiological binding sites for these inhibitors [Liu, S., Neidhardt, E. A., Grossman, T. H., Ocain, T., and Clardy J. (2000) Structure 8, 25-33].