A Cytosolic Protein Catalyzes the Release of GDP from p21 ras

Abstract

The rate of release of guanine nucleotides from the ras proteins (Ras) is extremely slow in the presence of Mg2+. It seemed likely, therefore that a factor might exist to accelerate the release of guanosine diphosphate (GDP), and hence the exchange of GDP for guanosine triphosphate (GTP). Such a factor has now been discovered in rat brain cytosol. Brain cytosol was found to catalyze, by orders of magnitude, the release of guanine nucleotides from recombinant v-H-Ras protein bound with [alpha-32P]GDP. This effect occurred even in the presence of a large excess of Mg2+, but was destroyed by heat or by incubation of the cytosol for an hour at 37 degrees C in the absence of phosphatase inhibitors. The effect was observed with either v-H-Ras or c-H-Ras, but not with p25rab3A, a small G protein with about 30% similarity to Ras. The effect could not be mimicked by addition of recombinant Ras-GAP or purified GEF, a guanine nucleotide exchange factor involved in the regulation of eukaryotic protein synthesis. By gel filtration chromatography, the factor appears to possess a molecular size between 100,000 and 160,000 daltons. This protein (Ras-guanine nucleotide-releasing factor, or Ras-GRF) may be involved in the activation of p21ras.