Regulation of 70-kDa heat-shock-protein ATPase activity and substrate binding by human DnaJ-like proteins, HSJ1a and HSJ1b

The DnaJ family of molecular chaperones is characterized by the presence of a highly conserved 70-amino-acid J domain. Escherichia coli DnaJ interacts with the 70-kDa heat-shock protein (DnaK), in vitro, to stimulate the 70-kDa heat-shock protein ATPase activity and modify substrate binding. The conservation of the interaction of DnaJ-like proteins with the 70-kDa heat-shock proteins has been demonstrated for the yeast protein YDJ1, a protein that shows full domain conservation with E. coli DnaJ. Human neurone-specific DnaJ-like proteins, HSJ1a and HSJ1b, possess a J domain and a glycine/phenylalanine-rich region in common with E. coli DnaJ, although the overall amino acid identity is less than 23%. We have investigated, in vitro, the interaction of HSJ1a and HSJ1b with the mammalian brain constitutive 70-kDa heat-shock protein (hsc70). The weak intrinsic ATPase activity of the constitutive 70-kDa heat-shock protein is enhanced more than fivefold by stoichiometric amounts of both HSJ1a and HSJ1b. This enhancement is mediated by an increase in the rate of bound ATP hydrolysis, whereas the rate of ADP release is unaffected. HSJ1 proteins appear to regulate the affinity of the 70-kDa constitutive heat-shock protein for the permanently unfolded substrate, carboxymethylated alpha-lactalbumin. A recent report [Palleros, D. R., Reid, K. L., Shi, L., Welch, W. J. & Fink, A. L. (1993) Nature 365, 664-666] has suggested that substrate release by 70-kDa heat-shock proteins requires a conformational change in these proteins induced by K+ in concert with ATP binding. In the presence of ATP, HSJ1 proteins reduce 70-kDa constitutive heat-shock protein/carboxymethylated alpha-lactalbumin complex formation both in the presence and absence of K+. This suggests that HSJ1 proteins induce a conformational change in the 70-kDa constitutive heat-shock protein that can mimic the effect mediated by K+ and therefore modulate 70-kDa heat-shock protein substrate release by another mechanism rather than merely stimulating the 70-kDa heat-shock protein ATPase activity. As HSJ1 proteins have limited similarity to DnaJ, we suggest that this action is being mediated by the J domain alone, and that this modulation of 70-kDa heat-shock-protein substrate binding will be common to all proteins that contain a J domain.