Role of Cytochrome b5 in the 17,20-Lyase Activity of P450c17
Walter L. Miller and
Richard J. Auchus
Department of Pediatrics
University of CaliforniaSan Francisco
San Francisco, California 94143-0978
In the September 1999 issue of this journal, Mapes et al. (1)
reported the important observation that cytochrome b5 is
preferentially expressed in the monkey zona reticularis, consistent
with the biochemical observation that the presence of b5
promotes the 17,20-lyase activity of human P450c17. This b5
mediated effect was first reported in 1982 (2), confirmed in 1992 and
1995 (3, 4), and the mechanism by which b5 exerts its
activity as an allosteric factor, rather than as an electron donor, was
established with human systems in 1998 (5). Mapes et al. (1)
state that the demonstration that P450c17 has both 17
-hydroxylase
and 17,20-lyase activities has fueled debate about the mechanism by
which 17,20-lyase activity is regulated, in view of the existence of
patients with isolated 17,20-lyase deficiency. There is little
remaining debate as the genetic and biochemical basis of isolated
17,20-lyase deficiency is now known. The molecular basis of 17,20-lyase
deficiency was determined in two patients by Geller et al.
(6) and in a third patient by Biason-Lauber et al. (7),
identifying missense mutations in the redox-partner binding-site in all
three cases. The mechanism by which these mutations cause loss of lyase
but not hydroxylase activity has been shown in the two index cases to
be due to disrupted interactions with both P450 oxidoreductase (6) and
with cytochrome b5 (8). The mechanism by which mutations in
the region of P450c17 that participates in redox partners interactions
has been established genetically, biochemically, and structurally (9).
Definitive understanding of the role of b5 will require the
study of b5-deficient patients that will represent a gene
knockout of nature; a mouse knockout would provide less information
because rodents do not express P450c17 in their adrenals (10). The
principal known physiologic role of cytochrome b5 is in
reducing methemoglobin, but most patients with hereditary
methemoglobinemia have defects in cytochrome b5 reductase
rather than in b5 itself (11). Only one patient with
cytochrome b5 deficiency has been reported (12) and studied
at a molecular genetic level (13). That patient was a male
pseudohermaphrodite who had female genitalia at birth, but,
unfortunately, data concerning adrenal and gonadal steroidogenesis have
not been reported for this patient. In a converse experiment of nature,
Sakai et al. (14) reported that adrenal adenomas that
overproduce 19-carbon steroids and, hence, have abundant 17,20-lyase
activity contain very large amounts of cytochrome b5. Thus,
the report of Mapes et al. (1) and a related report by
Yanase et al. (15) concerning the human adrenal provide
further anatomical evidence for the established central role of
cytochrome b5 in regulating the 17,20-lyase activity of
human P450c17.
Footnotes
Address correspondence to: Walter L.
Miller, Department of Pediatrics, University of CaliforniaSan
Francisco, Building MR-4, Room 209, San Francisco, California
94143-0978.
Received October 12, 1999.
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