Tyrosine sulfation, a post-translational modification of microvillar enzymes in the small intestinal enterocyte

Protein sulfation in small intestinal epithelial cells was studied by labelling of organ cultured mucosal explants with [35S]-sulfate. Six bands in SDS-PAGE became selectively labelled; four, of 250, 200, 166 and 130 kd, were membrane-bound and two, of 75 and 60 kd, were soluble. The sulfated membrane-bound components were all enriched in the microvillar fraction but either absent or barely detectable in intracellular or basolateral membranes. Immunopurification of sucrase-isomaltase, maltase-glucoamylase, aminopeptidase N and aminopeptidase A showed that these microvillar enzymes become sulfated. Most if not all the sulfate was bound to tyrosine residues rather than to the carbohydrate of the microvillar enzymes, showing that this type of modification can occur on plasma membrane proteins as well as on secretory proteins.