Characterisation of an alkaline peptidase of Trypanosoma cruzi and other trypanosomatids.

A peptidase activity was purified from extracts of Trypanosoma cruzi on the basis of its ability to cleave benzoyl-arginine-p-nitroanilide. The enzyme was considered to be a cysteine-type peptidase with unusually low sensitivity to E-64. It has a pH optimum of about 8.0 for p-nitroanilides, and cleaves peptide bonds on the carboxyl side of arginine and, to a lesser extent, lysine residues. Cleavage of different substrates occurred at rates that were determined by their catalytic constants (kcat): the peptidase had the same Michaelis constant (about 30 microM) for all substrates tested. Evidence is presented that the peptidase is the major cysteine peptidase in T. cruzi extracts that cleaves p-nitroanilides next to basic amino acid residues at pH 8. The enzyme was detected in all stages of the life cycle of T. cruzi. Furthermore, evidence is presented, based on pH optima, inhibitor sensitivity, substrate specificity and kinetics, and electrophoretic mobility, that a similar or identical enzyme occurs in fifteen other species of trypanosomatid.