Purification and affinity labeling of dihydropyridine receptor from rabbit skeletal muscle membranes

Undegraded dihydropyridine (DHP)-receptor (putatively a voltage-gated Ca2+ channel) has been purified as a 340-kDa protein complex to approximately 80% homogeneity (2.4 nmol of DHP-receptor per mg of protein) from rabbit skeletal muscle by a rapid purification protocol. Transverse-tubule membranes were prepared in high yield by Ribi-press treatment. The DHP-receptor complex was solubilized in 1% digitonin followed by a two-step chromatographic purification procedure. The equilibrium dissociation constant of [3H](+)-PN200-110 binding (Kd; 0.9 nM) was not significantly changed by solubilization or purification. The purified DHP-receptor is composed of two subunits with apparent molecular masses of 148 kDa and 195 kDa migrating in polyacrylamide gels under nonreducing conditions as a single moiety of approximately 300 kDa. The 195-kDa subunit was affinity-labeled with [3H]azidopine in both transverse-tubule membranes and purified DHP-receptor preparations. The subunit can be degraded by high-energy irradiation to a 26-kDa peptide and by proteolysis to a 32-kDa peptide. Thus, it is probably due to proteolytic cleavage and/or photolysis that neither purification nor affinity-labeling studies have previously identified a DHP-receptor subunit of comparable molecular mass (195 kDa).