SUMO-specific proteases, known as Ulps in baker’s yeast and SENPs in humans, have important roles in controlling the dynamics of SUMO-modified proteins. They display distinct modes of action and specificity, in that they may act on the SUMO precursor, mono-sumoylated, and/or polysumoylated proteins, and they might be specific for substrates with certain SUMO paralogs. SUMO chains may be dismantled either by endo or exo mechanisms. Biochemical characterization of a protease usually requires purification of the protein of interest. Developing a purification protocol, however, can be very difficult, and in some cases, isolation of a protease in its pure form may go along with a substantial loss of activity. To characterize the reaction mechanism of Ulps, we have developed an in vitro assay, which makes use of substrates endowed with artifi- cial poly-SUMO chains of defined lengths, and S. cerevisiae Ulp enzymes in crude extract from E. coli. This fast and economic approach should be applicable to SUMO-specific proteases from other species as well.
CITATION STYLE
Eckhoff, J., & Dohmen, R. J. (2016). In vitro characterization of chain depolymerization activities of SUMO-specific proteases. In Methods in Molecular Biology (Vol. 1475, pp. 123–135). Humana Press Inc. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4939-6358-4_9
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