Bajaj_2016_Appl.Biochem.Biotechnol_180_165

Organophosphate (OP) compounds are neurotoxic chemicals, and current treatments available for OP-poisoning are considered as unsatisfactory and inadequate. There is an urgent need for the development of more effective treatment(s) for OP-poisoning. Human paraoxonase 1 (h-PON1) is known to hydrolyze a variety of OP-compounds and is a leading candidate for the development of prophylactic and therapeutic agent against OP-poisoning in humans. Non-availability of effective system(s) for the production of recombinant h-PON1 (rh-PON1) makes it hard to produce improved variant(s) of this enzyme and analyze their in vivo efficacy in animal models. Production of recombinant h-PON1 (rh-PON1) using an Escherichia coli expression system is a key to develop variant(s) of h-PON1. Recently, we have developed a procedure to produce active rh-PON1 enzymes by using E. coli expression system. In this study, we have characterized the OP-hydrolyzing properties of refolded rh-PON1(wt) and rh-PON1(H115W;R192K) variant. Our results show that refolded rh-PON1(H115W;R192K) variant exhibit enhanced OP-hydrolyzing activity in in vitro and ex vivo assays and exhibited prophylactic activity in mouse model of OP-poisoning, suggesting that refolded rh-PON1 can be developed as a therapeutic candidate.