N-Acetylaspartate Is an Important Brain Osmolyte

Overview

Journal Biomolecules

Publisher MDPI

Specialties Biochemistry
Molecular Biology

Date 2020 Feb 16

PMID 32059525

Citations 6

Authors

Marina Warepam

Khurshid Ahmad

Safikur Rahman

Hamidur Rahaman

Kritika Kumari

Laishram Rajendrakumar Singh

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Most of the human diseases related to various proteopathies are confined to the brain, which leads to the development of various forms of neurological disorders. The human brain consists of several osmolytic compounds, such as N-Acetylaspartate (NAA), myo-inositol (mI), glutamate (Glu), glutamine (Gln), creatine (Cr), and choline-containing compounds (Cho). Among these osmolytes, the level of NAA drastically decreases under neurological conditions, and, hence, NAA is considered to be one of the most widely accepted neuronal biomarkers in several human brain disorders. To date, no data are available regarding the effect of NAA on protein stability, and, therefore, the possible effect of NAA under proteopathic conditions has not been fully uncovered. To gain an insight into the effect of NAA on protein stability, thermal denaturation and structural measurements were carried out using two model proteins at different pH values. The results indicate that NAA increases the protein stability with an enhancement of structure formation. We also observed that the stabilizing ability of NAA decreases in a pH-dependent manner. Our study indicates that NAA is an efficient protein stabilizer at a physiological pH.

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