Structure of canine pulmonary surfactant apoprotein: cDNA and complete amino acid sequence.

The apoproteins of pulmonary surfactant (PSAP) are thought to be critical for normal surfactant function. They bind to surfactant phospholipids and enhance their ability to form surface films in vitro. These acidic glycoproteins have monomeric molecular weights of 36,000, 32,000, and 28,000 (PSAP-36, -32, and -28). Each member of this family of proteins has a similar amino acid composition and their differences in electrophoretic mobility are due in part to glycosylation. We have derived the full amino acid sequence of PSAP-32 from the nucleotide sequence of PSAP cDNA. A cDNA library was prepared from canine lung poly(A)+ RNA and screened with oligonucleotide probes that were based on the NH2-terminal amino acids of PSAP-32 determined by Edman degradation. This protein has the striking feature of collagen-like and non-collagen-like sequences in the same polypeptide chain. There are 24 Gly-Xaa-Yaa triplets, where Yaa is often hydroxyproline. These repeats comprise one-third of PSAP near the NH2 terminus. The remaining two-thirds of PSAP is resistant to bacterial collagenase digestion and contains a possible N-glycosylation site near the carboxyl terminus. The NH2-terminal one-third of PSAP-32 probably contains the cysteine involved in interchain disulfide bonds.