Effect of Cholesterol, Fatty Acyl Chain Composition, and Bilayer Curvature on the Interaction of Cytochrome b5 with Liposomes of Phosphatidylcholines

To determine the effect of cholesterol and lipid packing on the solubility of membrane proteins in bilayers, cytochrome b5 incorporation into phosphatidylcholine (PC) liposomes was determined as a function of bilayer curvature (SUVs versus LUVs), fatty acyl chain composition, and cholesterol content. The equilibrium affinity constant for the formation of a 1:1 b5/PC complex, Kp, and the number of PC's per "site" at saturation, n, were determined from binding isotherms, which were obtained by measuring the increase in intrinsic tryptophan fluorescence. With LUVs, n was also determined directly by gel filtration. The following results were obtained: (1) Both Kp and the saturating level of b5 binding, s (n-1), are significantly greater for SUVs than for LUVs. In LUVs, a binding site must consist of several surrounding lipid layers. (2) Cholesterol reduces Kp and s by factors that range from 1 to > 100. Binding inhibition is highly sensitive to the liposome size and to the fatty acyl composition of the PC; the latter correlates with the condensing effects on PC: C1satC2mono > C1satC2di approximately natural mixtures > C1unsat-C2unsat. (3) With POPC LUVs, the binding inhibition was 3.6-, 1.4- and 17-fold within the ranges of 0-20, 20-33, and 33-50 mole percent cholesterol, respectively. (4) The equilibrium binding constant to SUVs is greater for liposomes that are prepared from natural PC mixtures than for vesicles of a single synthetic phospholipid. The reductions in b5 binding correlate with reductions in bilayer free volume, which were calculated from monolayer studies of the lipid mixtures. The sensitivity of liposome saturability to bilayer curvature, fatty acyl chain composition, and cholesterol content may account for the disparate results among previous studies of cholesterol-protein interactions. A more significant implication is that in biological membranes with high levels of cholesterol, subtle variations in the fatty acyl chain composition could substantially affect the solubility and physical states of integral membrane proteins.