Oat seed globulin: subunit characterization and demonstration of its synthesis as a precursor

The predominant storage protein of oat (Avena sativa L.) seeds is a saline-soluble globulin with a mol wt of 320,000 which is composed of six large (M_r = 35,000 to 40,000) and six small (M_r = 20,000 to 25,000) subunits. Experiments were conducted to further describe the subunit polypeptides and to identify the initial translation products of globulin mRNAs. Approximately 20 large subunits and 10 small subunits were resolved by two-dimensional gel analysis. The large and small subunits had acidic and basic isoelectric points, respectively. Disulfide-linked complexes of one large and one small subunit were isolated by extraction in buffer lacking a reducing agent. The NH₂-terminal sequence of the small subunits was homologous to a small subunit of soybean glycinin. Immunoprecipitation of in vitro translation products of poly(A)⁺ RNA with anti-oat globulin sera yielded M_r = 60,000 to 68,000 polypeptides. In vivo labeling of spikelets with radioactive amino acids resulted in high amounts of incorporation into polypeptides with M_r = 65,000 to 68,000 which were immunoprecipitated with anti-globulin sera. These two results suggest oat globulin is synthesized as a higher mol wt precursor which is subsequently processed to yield the large and small subunit polypeptides.