Partial purification from Saccharomyces cerevisiae of a soluble glucosidase which removes the terminal glucose from the oligosaccharide Glc3Man9GlcNAc2.

Glucosidase activities capable of removing the three glucose residues from Glc3Man9GlcNAc2 oligosaccharide were detected in a cell-free preparation of Saccharomyces cerevisiae X-2180. The glucosidase which cleaves the glucose residue at the nonreducing terminus (Glc3Man9GlcNAc2 oligosaccharide glucosidase) was equally distributed between the particulate and the supernatant fractions obtained after centrifugation of the yeast homogenate at 27,000 X g for 30 min. The membrane-bound activity was stimulated by Triton X-100, whereas the supernatant activity was not affected. The soluble Glc3Man9GlcNAc2 oligosaccharide glucosidase was partially purified from the supernatant by ammonium sulfate fractionation followed by DEAE-Sephadex chromatography. It was clearly separated from alpha-glucosidase, which acts onp-nitrophenyl-alpha-D-glucopyranoside, but still contained beta-glucosidase and alpha-mannosidase acting on p-nitrophenyl-beta-D-glucopyranoside and alpha-D-mannopyranoside, respectively. The Glc3Man9GlcNAc2 oligosaccharide glucosidase had a pH optimum of 6.8, and showed no requirement for divalent cations. The enzyme was very active with glucose-labeled Glc3Man9GlcNAc2, was slightly active with Glc2Man9GlcNAc2, and showed no activity with Glc1Man9GlcNAc2. These properties suggest that this enzyme is involved in the first step of processing of oligosaccharides after transfer from dolichyl pyrophosphate to proteins.