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The highly potent bell pepper odorant 2-isobutyl-3-3Hmethoxypyrazine ( 3HIBMP) binds specifically and saturably to bovine and rat nasal epithelium. Specific binding is not detected in 11 other tissues assayed, and in the rat binding is 9 times higher in olfactory than in respiratory epithelium. We have purified to apparent homogeneity a soluble pyrazine odorant binding protein that constitutes approximately equal to 1% of the total soluble protein in bovine nasal epithelium. Polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis shows a single band of 19,000 Da and gel filtration data suggest that the native protein is a dimer of 38,000 Da. Binding of 3HIBMP to the purified protein reveals two binding sites (Kd = 10 X 10(-9) M, Bmax = 135 pmol per mg of protein; Kd = 3 X 10(-6) M, Bmax = 25 nmol per mg of protein). The binding affinities of a homologous series of pyrazine odorants correlate with the human odor detection thresholds of these compounds. This correlation, together with the regional distribution of the protein, suggests that the protein is a physiologically relevant olfactory receptor.
Pevsner et al. (Wed,) studied this question.