Purification, Some Properties, and Tissue Distribution of a Major Lysosome-Associated Membrane Glycoprotein (r-lamp-2) of Rat Liver

Abstract

We previously purified and characterized a major lysosomal membrane glycoprotein (r-lamp-1) from rat liver [Akasaki et al. (1990) Chem. Pharm. Bull. 38, 2766–2770]. The present study describes the purification of another major lysosomal membrane glycoprotein (r-lamp-2) from rat liver and compares the tissue distribution of r-lamp-1 and r-lamp-2 in rats. R-lamp-2 was purified to apparent electrophoretic homogeneity from rat liver by a simple method with a protein yield of approximately 4.0 μg/g wet weight of liver. The purification procedure includes: preparation of tritosomal membranes, extraction of tritosomal membranes with Lubrol PX, wheat germ agglutinin (WGA)-Sepharose affinity chromatography, and monoclonal antibody-Sepharose affinity chromatography. R-lamp-2 exhibited an M_r of 96,000 on SDS-PAGE and had an acidic pI of < 3.5. R-lamp-2 contained 52.3% carbohydrates. Its carbohydrate moieties were composed of numerous sialyl complex type N-linked oligosaccharides and small amounts of O-linked oligosaccharides. Both r-lamp-1 and r-lamp-2 were detected in all rat tissues examined by immunoblot analyses, while their apparent molecular weights differed among the tissues. Immunological quantitative analysis showed that the protein concentrations of r-lamp-2 were consistently lower than those of r-lamp-1 in all the tissues tested. There was a significant correlation with a regression coefficient of 0.86 in the tissue distribution between r-lamp-1 and r-lamp-2. A good correlation was also observed in the tissue distribution between acid phosphatase and r-lamp-2. These results suggested that r-lamp-1 and r-lamp-2 are constitutive proteins of lysosomal membranes and they are functionally related to each other.