Subunit interactions in rabbit-muscle glyceraldehyde-phosphate dehydrogenase, as measured by NAD+ and NADH binding.

1. The binding parameters for NADH and NAD+ to rabbit-muscle glyceraldehyde-phosphate dehydrogenase (D-glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate:NAD+ oxidoreductase (phosphorylating), EC 1.2.1.12) have been measured by quenching of the flourescence of the protein and the NADH. 2. The fact that the degree of protein fluorescence quenching by bound NAD+ or NADH, excited at 285 nm and measured at 340 nm ('blue' tryptophans), is not linearly related to the saturation functions of these nucleotides, leads to a slight overestimation of the interaction energy and an underestimation of the concentration of sites, if linearity is assumed. 3. This is also the case for NADH, but not for NAD+, when the protein fluorescence is excited at 305 nm and measured at 390 nm ('red' tryptophans). 4. The binding of NAD+ can be described by a model in which the binding of NAD+, via negative interactions within the dimer, induces weaker binding sites, with the result that the microscopic dissociation constant is 0.08 microM at low saturation and 0.18 microM for the holoenzyme. 5. The binding of NADH can be described on the basis of the same model, the dissociation constant at low saturation being 0.5 microM and of the holoenzyme 1.0 microM. 6. The fluorescence of bound NADH is not sensitive to the conformational changes that cause the decrease in affinity of bound NAD+ or NADH. 7. The binding of NAD+ to the 3-phosphoglyceroyl enzyme can be described by a dissociation constant that is at least two orders of magnitude greater than the dissociation constants of the unacylated enzyme. The affinity of NAD+ to this form of the enzyme is in agreement with the Ki calculated from product inhibition by NAD+ of the reductive dephosphorylation of 1,3-diphosphoglycerate.