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Insulin is an amyloid-forming polypeptide built of two disulfide-linked chains (A and B), both themselves amyloidogenic. An interesting property of insulin is that agitation strongly influences the course of its aggregation, resulting in characteristic chiral superstructures of amyloid fibrils. Here, we investigate the self-assembly of these superstructures by comparing the quiescent and vortex-assisted aggregation of insulin and its individual A and B chains in the presence or absence of reducing agent tris(2-carboxyethyl)phosphine (TCEP). Our study shows that only the B chain in the presence of TCEP is converted into aggregates with morphology (according to atomic force microscopy) and optical activity (manifested as an extrinsic Cotton effect induced in bound thioflavin T) characteristic of amyloid superstructures that are normally formed by insulin in the absence of TCEP. In contrast to more rigid B-peptide fibrils, elongated aggregates of the A peptide become amorphous upon agitation. Moreover, the aggregation of equimolar mixture of both peptides does not produce highly ordered entities. Our results suggest that the dynamics of the B chain are the driving force for the assembly of superstructures, with the A chain being complicit as long as its own dynamics are controlled by the firm attachment to the B chain provided by the intact covalent structure of insulin.

The irreversibility and autocatalytic character of amyloidogenesis and the polymorphism of amyloid fibrils underlie the phenomenon of self-propagating strains, wherein the mother seed, rather than the seeding environment, determines the properties of daughter fibrils. Here we study the formation of amyloid fibrils from bovine insulin and the recombinant Lys(B31)-Arg(B32) human insulin analog. The two polypeptides are similar enough to cross-seed but, upon spontaneous aggregation, form amyloid fibrils with distinct spectral features in the infrared amide I' band region. When bovine insulin is cross-seeded with the analog amyloid (and vice versa), the shape, absorption maximum, and even fine fingerprint features of the amide I' band are passed from the mother to daughter fibrils with a high degree of fidelity. Although the differences in primary structure between bovine insulin and the Lys(B31)-Arg(B32) analog of human insulin lie outside of the polypeptide's critical amyloidogenic regions, they affect the secondary structure of fibrils, possibly the formation of intermolecular salt bridges, and the susceptibility to dissection and denaturation with dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO). All these phenotypic features of mother fibrils are imprinted in daughter amyloid upon cross-seeding. Analysis of noncooperative DMSO-induced denaturation of daughter fibrils suggests that the self-propagating polymorphism underlying the emergence of new amyloid strains is encoded on the level of secondary structure. Our findings have been discussed in the context of polymorphism of fibrils, amyloid strains, and possible implications for mechanisms of amyloidogenesis.

Amyloid fibrils, which are often associated with certain degenerative disorders, reveal a number of intriguing spectral properties. However, the relationship between the structure of fibrils and their optical traits remains poorly understood. Poly(L-glutamic) acid is a model polypeptide shown recently to form amyloid-like fibrils with an atypical infrared amide I' band at 1595 cm(-1), which has been attributed to the presence of bifurcated hydrogen bonds coupling C═O and N-D groups of the main chains to glutamate side chains. Here we show that this unusual amide I' band is observed only for fibrils grown from pure enantiomers of the polypeptide, whereas fibrils precipitating from equimolar mixtures of poly(L-glutamic) and poly(D-glutamic) acids have amide I' bands at 1684 and 1612 cm(-1), which are indicative of a typical intermolecular antiparallel β-sheet. Pure enantiomers of polyglutamic acid form spirally twisted superstructures whose handedness is correlated to the amino acid chirality, while fibrils prepared from the racemate do not form scanning electron microscopy (SEM)-detectable mesoscopically ordered structures. Vibrational circular dichroism (VCD) spectra of β-aggregates prepared from mixtures of all L- or D-polyglutamic acid in varying ratios indicate that the enhancement of VCD intensity correlates with the presence of the twisted superstructures. Our results demonstrate that both IR absorption and enhanced VCD are sensitive to subtle packing defects taking place within the compact structure of amyloid fibrils.

Nanostructuring of noble metal surfaces with biomorphic and biological templates facilitates a variety of applications of surface enhanced Raman scattering (SERS). Here we show that the newly reported insulin amyloid superstructures may be employed as stable nanoscaffolds for metallic Au films providing an effective substrate for SERS on covalently bound molecules of 4-mercaptobenzoic acid (4-MBA). The vortex-aligned insulin fibrils are capable of templating nanopatterns in sputtered Au layers without overlapping the SERS spectra of 4-MBA with vibrational bands stemming from the protein. This holds true regardless of whether the incident laser beam is directly backscattered from the 4-MBA layer, or after passage through the insulin amyloid layer.