Cytochrome c Peroxidase: A Model Heme Protein

Cytochrome c peroxidase (CcP) is a yeast mitochondrial enzyme which catalyzes the reduction of hydrogen peroxide to water using two equivalents of ferrocytochrome c. The CcP/cytochrome c system has many features which make it a very useful model for detailed investigation of heme protein structure/function relationships including activation of hydrogen peroxide, protein-protein interactions, and long-range electron transfer. Both CcP and cytochrome c are single heme, single subunit proteins of modest size. High-resolution crystallographic structures of both proteins, of one-to-one complexes of the two proteins, and a number of active-site mutants are available. Site-directed mutagenesis studies indicate that the distal histidine in CcP is primarily responsible for rapid utilization of hydrogen peroxide implying significantly different properties of the distal histidine in the peroxidases compared to the globins. CcP and cytochrome c bind to form a dynamic one-to-one complex. The binding is largely electrostatic in nature with a small, unfavorable enthalpy of binding and a large positive entropy change upon complex formation. The cytochrome c-binding site on CcP has been mapped in solution by measuring the binding affinities between cytochrome c and a number of CcP surface mutations. The binding site for cytochrome c in solution is consistent with the crystallographic structure of the one-to-one complex. Evidence for the involvement of a second, low-affinity cytochrome c-binding site on CcP in long-range electron transfer between the two proteins is reviewed.