XAS Spectroscopy Sulfur and the Brew Within Blood Cells from Ascidia ceratodes

摘要

We report the first use of K-edge x-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS) as a direct spectroscopic probe of pH and cytosolic emf within living cells. A new accuracy metric of model-based fits to K-edge spectra is further developed. Sulfur functional groups in three collections of living blood cells and one sample of cleared blood plasma from the tunicate Ascidia ceratodes were speciated using K-edge XAS. Cysteine and cystine, the preferred thiol-disulfide model, averaged about 12% of total sulfur. Sulfate monoesters and cyclic diesters unexpectedly constituted 36% of blood cell sulfur. Soluble sulfate averaged about 25% across the three blood cell samples, while the ratio of SO4²⁻ to HSO4⁻ implied average signet ring vacuolar pH values of 0.85, 1.4, or 3.1. Intracellular (VSO4)⁺ was unobserved, while [V(RSO3)n]⁽³⁻ⁿ⁾⁺ was detected in the two lowest pH blood cell samples. About 5% of sulfur was distributed as mono- or dibenzothiophene or ethylene-epi-sulfide, or as a thiadiazole reminiscent of the polycarpathiamines. Blood plasma was dominated by sulfate (83%), but with 15% of an alkylsulfate ester and about 2% of low-valent sulfur. Gravimetric analysis of soluble sulfate yielded average concentrations of blood cell sulfur. Average [cysteine] and [cystine] (ranging ~10–30 mM and ~20–90 mM, respectively) implied a blood-cell cytosolic emf values of approximately −0.20 V. High cellular [cysteine] is consistent with the proposed model for enzymatic reduction of vanadate by endogenous thiol, wherein the trajectory of metal site-symmetry is controlled and directed through to a thermodynamically favored 7-coordinate V(III) product.