Random mutagenesis and disulfide bond formation improved thermostability in microbial transglutaminase

Microbial transglutaminase (MTG) from Streptomyces mobaraensis is widely used in the food and pharmaceutical industries for cross-linking and post-translational modification of proteins. It is believed that its industrial applications could be further broadened by improving its thermostability. In our previous study, we showed that the introduction of structure-based disulfide bonds improved the thermostability of MTG, and we succeeded in obtaining a thermostable mutant, D3C/G283C, with a T₅₀ (incubation temperature at which 50% of the initial activity remains) 9 °C higher than that of wild-type MTG. In this study, we performed random mutations using D3C/G283C as a template and found several amino acid substitutions that contributed to the improvement of thermostability, and investigated a thermostable mutant (D3C/S101P/G157S/G250R/G283C) with three amino acid mutations in addition to the disulfide bond. The T₅₀ of this mutant was 10 °C higher than that of the wild type, the optimal temperature for enzymatic reaction was increased to 65 °C compared to 50 °C for the wild type, and the catalytic efficiency (k_cat/K_m) at 37.0 °C was increased from 3.3 × 10² M^-1 s^-1 for the wild type to 5.9 × 10² M^-1 s^-1. X-ray crystallography of the D3C/G283C MTG showed no major structural differences against wild-type MTG. Structural differences were found that may contribute to thermostabilization and improve catalytic efficiency. KEY POINTS: • Improved heat resistance is essential to broaden the application of MTG. • The MTG mutant D3C/S101P/G157S/G250R/G283C showed improved thermostability. • X-ray crystallography of the disulfide bridge mutant D3C/G283C MTG was elucidated.