Computational studies of electron‐transfer processes in old yellow enzyme

Old Yellow Enzyme (OYE) is a flavoenzyme that was first isolated from brewer's bottom yeast. Homologues have been identified in other strains of yeast, bacteria, and plants. In plants, the OYE homologue functions enzymatically in the synthesis of plant hormones, but the biological function of OYE in yeast is still unknown. Flavin mononucleotide (FMN) is the cofactor that is noncovalently bound in the enzyme. OYE binds several phenolic ligands that serve as models for reactive biological substrates. These complexes have broad long-wavelength absorption bands, which have been ascribed to charge-transfer interactions, with the phenolate anion acting as the electron donor and the FMN as the acceptor [Abramovitz, A. S.; Massey, V. J Bio Chem 1976, 251, 5327–5336]. The computational characterization of these electronic transitions in the active site will help in understanding the biological processes in the enzyme. It was found that at several levels of computational methods, and through computationally mutating relevant amino acids, a charge-transfer process is occurring. This result agrees with previous experimental work and is consistent with all ultraviolet–visible spectrophotometric data. The preliminary results for the computational studies of these electron-transfer processes will be presented. © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Int J Quantum Chem, 2001