Under a suitable condition of crystallization, dark brown rhombohedron crystals (the lengths of the longest two diagonals were 0.25 and 0.12 mm, respectively) could be obtained from nitrogenase CrFe protein purified from a mutant UW3 of Azotobacter vinelandii Lipmann grown in Cr-containing but NH3-free Medium, The possibility of crystallization, as well as the. number, size and quality of crystals obviously depended on the concentrations of PEG 8000, MgCl2, NaCl, Tris and Hepes buffer, and methods of crystallization. The optimum concentrations of the chemicals for crystallization of CrFe protein were slightly different from those for crystallization of MnFe protein from UW3 grown in Mn and DeltanifZ MoFe protein from a nifZ deleted strain of A. vinelandii. The crystal seemed to be formed from CrFe protein.
A mutant UW 3, which is unable to fix N 2 in the presence of Mo (Nif -) but undergo phenotypic reversal to Nif + under Mo deficiency, was able to grow in Mo- and NH 3-deficient medium containing Mn, and the growth was accelerated by Mn at low concentration. A partly purified nitrogenase component Ⅰ protein separated from UW 3 grown in the Mn-containing medium was shown to contain Fe and Mn atoms (ratio of Fe/Mo/Mn: 10.41/0.19/1.00) with C 2H 2- and H +-reducing activity which almost equal to half of that of MoFe protein purified from wild-type mutant of Azotobacter vinelandii Lipmann. This protein was obviously different from MoFe protein in both absorption spectrum and circular dichroism, and the molecular weight of subunits in Mn-containing protein was close to that of α subunit in MoFe protein. The preliminary results indicated that the protein containing Mn might be a nitrogenase component Ⅰ protein.
Under a suitable condition of crystallization, dark brown short rhombohedron crystals could be obtained from nitrogenase MnFe protein purified from a mutant UW3 of Azotobacter vinelandii Lipmann grown in Mn-containing but Mo- and NH3-free medium. The possibility of crystallization, and number, size and quality of crystals were obviously dependent on concentrations of NaCl, MgCl2, PEG 8000,Tris and Hepes buffer and on methods for crystallization. PEG concentration affected on the shape of the crystals. The optimal, concentrations of the chemicals for crystallization of MnFe protein were slightly different from those for crystallization of Delta nifZ MoFe protein from a nifZ deleted strain of Azotobacter vinelandii. SDS-PAGE showed that the protein from the dissolved crystals was almost the same as MnFe protein before crystallization, indicating that the crystal was formed from MnFe protein.
A mutant UW 3, which is unable to fix N 2 in the presence of Mo (Nif -) but can undergo phenotypic reversal to Nif + under Mo_deficient conditions, was able to grow in Cr_containing but Mo_ and NH 3_deficient medium. A partly purified nitrogenase component Ⅰ protein obtained from UW 3 grown on the Cr_containing medium was shown to contain Fe and Cr (atom ratio of Fe to Cr and Mo to Cr: 11.60 and 0.41) and to have 70% of the C 2H 2_ and H +_reduction activity of MoFe protein from the wild_type strain of Azotobacter vinelandii Lipmann. The Cr_containing protein was different in subunit composition from that of MnFe protein purified from the mutant strain grown in the presence of Mn, but similar to that of MoFe protein, that is, it was a tetramer composed of two different subunits (α 2β 2). The preliminary results indicated that the Cr_containing protein might be a nitrogenase component Ⅰ protein.
