Marked detergents effects on safranine T-mediated photo-induced electron transfer in cytochrome P-450 1A2

Cytochrome P-450 accepts electrons from electron transfer proteins to facilitate monooxidation reactions. It is suggested that basic amino acids such as Lys and Arg on the P-450 molecular surface interact with acidic amino acids such as Glu and Asp of the electron transfer protein. Safranine T is a basic compound which mediates electron transfer with illumination. It was found with flash photolysis that an electron from photo-reduced safranine T quickly reaches the heme iron of cytochrome P-450 1A2 (P-450 1A2). The photo-induced reduction kinetics of P-450 1A2 were analyzed by the Runge-Kutta method on the second order assumption. The electron-transfer rate constant from safranine T to P-450 1A2 was 2.1 x 10(6) M-1s-1. The rate constant was remarkably increased up to 3.1 x 10(8) M-1s-1 by adding cholic acid, while that was drastically reduced down to 3.5 x 10(4) M-1s-1 by adding Emulgen 913. The electron-transfer rate of a His163-Glu mutant, which has a 40 mV lower redox potential than that of the wild type, was the same as that of the wild type in the absence of the detergents, although the reduced fraction of the mutant was 30% lower than that of the wild type. The electron-transfer rate of the mutant also changed significantly by adding the detergents in the same way as the wild type. Based on these results, together with optical absorbance and fluorescence data, we discuss the inter- and intramolecular electron-transfer mechanism of P-450 1A2.