Massey V, Hemmerich P
Biochemistry. 1978 Jan 10;17(1):9-16. doi: 10.1021/bi00594a002.
Deazaflavins have been found to act as potent catalysts in the photoreduction of flavoproteins in the presence of EDTA and other "photosubstrates". In distinction to the catalysis brought about by normal flavins which involves dark reaction of the photoreduced flavin catalyst, the mechanism of the catalysis by deazaflavins has been shown to involve unstable, strongly reducing radicals which are generated by photolysis of a preformed covalent dimer. By this new method it is possible to reduce not only flavoproteins but a variety of other redox proteins, including heme proteins and iron-sulfur proteins. By virtue of its great catalytic efficiency, it is possible to employ concentrations of deazaflavin sufficiently low as not to interfere with the spectral evaluation of the reduced proteins obtained.
已发现脱氮黄素在存在乙二胺四乙酸（EDTA）和其他“光底物”的情况下，可作为黄素蛋白光还原的有效催化剂。与正常黄素所引发的涉及光还原黄素催化剂暗反应的催化作用不同，脱氮黄素的催化机制已表明涉及由预先形成的共价二聚体光解产生的不稳定、强还原性自由基。通过这种新方法，不仅可以还原黄素蛋白，还可以还原多种其他氧化还原蛋白，包括血红素蛋白和铁硫蛋白。由于其极高的催化效率，可以使用浓度足够低的脱氮黄素，以免干扰所获得的还原蛋白的光谱评估。
