Kinin-forming enzyme in human skin: the purification and characterization of a kinin-forming enzyme.

A kinin-forming-enzyme in human skin extract was further purified by successive column chromatography on DEAE-cellulose, Hydroxylapatite-cellulose and Sepharose-4B. By these procedures, 2.7 mg of purified enzyme was obtained from 10 gm of original skin. The purified material was homogeneous as ascertained by cellulose acetate membrane electrophoresis, sodium dodecyl sulfate polyacrylamide gel disc electrophoresis and ultracentrifugation. It had an S20,w value of 4.3 and an apparent molecular weight of 104,000 as measured by gel filtration on Sephadex G-200. The purified enzyme was comparatively heat-stable, but was unstable below pH values of 5 and above pH 9. It possessed arginine or lysine esterolytic activity, but not tyrosine or tryptophane esterolytic activity and denatured proteolytic activity. This enzyme was not affected by metal ion, cystein, glutathion or rho-chloromercuribenzoate, but was strongly inhibited by alpha-N-rho-tosyl-L-lysine chloromethyl ketone or soybean-trypsin inhibitor. It was also inhibited by alpha 1-antitrypsin, but not by alpha 2-macroglobulin. This enzyme was confirmed to be immunologically distinct from human plasma, urinary or pancreas kallikrein.