Cold lability of the mutant forms of Escherichia coli inorganic pyrophosphatase

The variants of Escherichia coli pyrophosphatase carrying the substitutions Glu20-->Asp, His136-->Gln or His140-->Gln are inactivated, in contrast to the wild-type enzyme, at temperatures below 25 degrees C: their activity measured at 25 degrees C decreases with decreasing the temperature of the stock enzyme solution. The inactivation is completely reversible and is explained by cold-induced dissociation of these hexameric enzymes into less active trimers.