The function of glutaredoxin GRXS15 is required for lipoyl-dependent dehydrogenases in mitochondria

authored by
Anna Moseler, Inga Kruse, Andrew E Maclean, Luca Pedroletti, Marina Franceschetti, Stephan Wagner, Regina Wehler, Katrin Fischer-Schrader, Gernot Poschet, Markus Wirtz, Peter Dörmann, Tatjana M Hildebrandt, Rüdiger Hell, Markus Schwarzländer, Janneke Balk, Andreas J Meyer
Abstract

Iron-sulfur (Fe-S) clusters are ubiquitous cofactors in all life and are used in a wide array of diverse biological processes, including electron transfer chains and several metabolic pathways. Biosynthesis machineries for Fe-S clusters exist in plastids, the cytosol and mitochondria. A single monothiol glutaredoxin (GRX) is involved in Fe-S cluster assembly in mitochondria of yeast and mammals. In plants, the role of the mitochondrial homologue GRXS15 has only partially been characterized. Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) grxs15 null mutants are not viable, but mutants complemented with the variant GRXS15 K83A develop with a dwarf phenotype similar to the knockdown line GRXS15amiR. In an in-depth metabolic analysis of the variant and knockdown GRXS15 lines, we show that most Fe-S cluster-dependent processes are not affected, including biotin biosynthesis, molybdenum cofactor biosynthesis, the electron transport chain and aconitase in the TCA cycle. Instead, we observed an increase in most TCA cycle intermediates and amino acids, especially pyruvate, glycine and branched-chain amino acids (BCAAs). Additionally, we found an accumulation of branched-chain α-keto acids (BCKAs), the first degradation products resulting from transamination of BCAAs. In wild-type plants, pyruvate, glycine and BCKAs are all metabolized through decarboxylation by mitochondrial lipoyl cofactor-dependent dehydrogenase complexes. These enzyme complexes are very abundant, comprising a major sink for lipoyl cofactor. Because biosynthesis of lipoyl cofactor depends on continuous Fe-S cluster supply to lipoyl synthase, this could explain why lipoyl cofactor-dependent processes are most sensitive to restricted Fe-S supply in grxs15 mutants.

Organisation(s)
Institute of Plant Genetics
External Organisation(s)
University of Bonn
University of Cologne
Heidelberg University
University of Münster
Université de Lorraine (UL)
University of East Anglia
John Innes Centre
Forschungszentrum Jülich
Type
Article
Journal
Plant physiology
Volume
186
Pages
1507-1525
No. of pages
19
ISSN
0032-0889
Publication date
07.2021
Publication status
Published
Peer reviewed
Yes
ASJC Scopus subject areas
Genetics, Physiology, Plant Science
Electronic version(s)
https://doi.org/10.1093/plphys/kiab172 (Access: Open)