The effects of the C-terminal amidation of mastoparans on their biological actions and interactions with membrane-mimetic systems

Polycationic peptides may present their C-termini in either amidated or acidic form; however, the effects of these conformations on the mechanisms of interaction with the membranes in general were not properly investigated up to now. Protonectarina-MP mastoparan with an either amidated or acidic C-terminus was utilized to study their interactions with anionic and zwitterionic vesicles, using measurements of dye leakage and a combination of H/D exchange and mass spectrometry to monitor peptide-membrane interactions. Mast cell degranulation, hemolysis and antibiosis assays were also performed using these peptides, and the results were correlated with the structural properties of the peptides. The C-terminal amidation promotes the stabilization of the secondary structure of the peptide, with a relatively high content of helical conformations, permitting a deeper interaction with the phospholipid constituents of animal and bacterial cell membranes. The results suggested that at low concentrations Protonectarina-MP interacts with the membranes in a way that both terminal regions remain positioned outside the external surface of the membrane, while the α-carbon backbone becomes partially embedded in the membrane core and changing constantly the conformation, and causing membrane destabilization. The amidation of the C-terminal residue appears to be responsible for the stabilization of the peptide conformation in a secondary structure that is richer in α-helix content than its acidic congener. The helical, amphipathic conformation, in turn, allows a deeper peptide-membrane interaction, favoring both biological activities that depend on peptide structure recognition by the GPCRs (such as exocytosis) and those activities dependent on membrane perturbation (such as hemolysis and antibiosis).