The 5-Hydroxytryptamine(4a) Receptor Is Palmitoylated at Two Different Sites, and Acylation Is Critically Involved in Regulation of Receptor Constitutive Activity

We have reported recently that the mouse 5-hydroxytryptamine(4a) (5-HT4(a)) receptor undergoes dynamic palmitoylation (Ponimaskin, E. G., Schmidt, M. F., Heine, M., Bickmeyer, U., and Richter, D. W. (2001) Biochem. J. 353, 627–663). In the present study, conserved cysteine residues 328/329 in the carboxyl terminus of the 5-HT4(a)receptor were identified as potential acylation sites. In contrast to other palmitoylated G-protein-coupled receptors, the additional cysteine residue 386 positioned close to the COOH-terminal end of the receptor was also found to be palmitoylated. Using pulse and pulse-chase labeling techniques, we demonstrated that palmitoylation of individual cysteines is a reversible process and that agonist stimulation of the 5-HT4(a) receptor independently increases the rate of palmitate turnover for both acylation sites. Analysis of acylation-deficient mutants revealed that non-palmitoylated 5-HT4(a) receptors were indistinguishable from the wild type in their ability to interact with Gs, to stimulate the adenylyl cyclase activity and to activate cyclic nucleotide-sensitive cation channels after agonist stimulation. The most distinctive finding of the present study was the ability of palmitoylation to modulate the agonist-independent constitutive 5-HT4(a) receptor activity. We demonstrated that mutation of the proximal palmitoylation site (Cys328 → Ser/Cys329 → Ser) significantly increases the capacity of receptors to convert from the inactive (R) to the active (R*) form in the absence of agonist. In contrast, the rate of isomerization from R to R* for the Cys386 → Ser as well as for the triple, non-palmitoylated mutant (Cys328 → Ser/Cys329→ Ser/Cys386 →Ser) was similar to that obtained for the wild type.