Gly85 to Val substitution in pro alpha 1(I) chain causes mild osteogenesis imperfecta and introduces a susceptibility to protease digestion.

In this paper we describe a mild moderate form of osteogenesis imperfecta caused by a point mutation in COL1A1 which converted glycine 85 to valine. The valine substitution introduced into the triple-helical domain of type-I collagen a conformational perturbation causing susceptibility to digestive proteases. In fact, SDS/PAGE of pepsin-treated collagen showed the presence of a faint band, migrating between alpha 1(I) and alpha 2(I), both in the medium and in the cell layer. On trypsin digestion the band, a shortened form of alpha 1(I), had a melting temperature of 39.5 degrees C. If the triple-helical collagen was obtained after trypsin or chymotrypsin digestion of procollagen, two shortened bands were identified; the enzymes cleaved about 40% of the trimers. The mutant procollagen was normally secreted and processed in the extracellular matrix at a normal rate. When native type-I collagen was formed after dextran-sulfate incubation, only chains of normal length were found, suggesting that the fibroblast proteases did not recognize the alteration introduced by the mutation. The effects of glycine 85 to valine substitution are compared with those produced by a previously described arginine substitution of the same residue (Deak et al., 1991).