Adipose tissue protein phosphatase inhibitor‐2

Rat fat cells contain three species of spontaneously active inhibitor proteins of protein phosphatase 1, as resolved by SDS-PAGE, with apparent molecular masses of 40 kDa, and 28 kDa respectively. The 33-kDa, thermostable inhibitor was highly purified from bovine adipose tissue and shown to be very similar to inhibitor-2 of skeletal muscle. It was phosphorylated, on threonine only, by glycogen synthase kinase 3. It formed an inactivated complex with protein phosphatase 1, that was reactivated by incubation with ATP-Mg and glycogen synthase kinase 3. By gel filtration it had a Stokes radius of 3.4 nm. Peptide and phosphopeptide maps, generated by Staphylococcus aureus V8 proteinase, trypsin or thermolysin, of the inhibitor and of the skeletal muscle inhibitor-2 were similar. The 40-kDa inhibitor, which was denatured by boiling, represents a novel protein phosphatase inhibitor protein or an undegraded precursor of inhibitor-2. The total activity of inhibitor-2-like material (thermostable and macromolecular) in an adipocyte cytosol extract corresponded to an intracellular concentration of 0.3 microM inhibitor-2.