The mechanism of coupling between oxido-reduction and proton translocation in respiratory chain enzymes

The respiratory chain of mitochondria and bacteria is made up of a set of membrane-associated enzyme complexes which catalyse sequential, stepwise transfer of reducing equivalents from substrates to oxygen and convert redox energy into a transmembrane protonmotive force (PMF) by proton translocation from a negative (N) to a positive (P) aqueous phase separated by the coupling membrane. There are three basic mechanisms by which a membrane-associated redox enzyme can generate a PMF. These are membrane anisotropic arrangement of the primary redox catalysis with: (i) vectorial electron transfer by redox metal centres from the P to the N side of the membrane; (ii) hydrogen transfer by movement of quinones across the membrane, from a reduction site at the N side to an oxidation site at the P side; (iii) a different type of mechanism based on co-operative allosteric linkage between electron transfer at the metal redox centres and transmembrane electrogenic proton translocation by apoproteins. The results of advanced experimental and theoretical analyses and in particular X-ray crystallography show that these three mechanisms contribute differently to the protonmotive activity of cytochrome c oxidase, ubiquinone-cytochrome c oxidoreductase and NADH-ubiquinone oxidoreductase of the respiratory chain. This review considers the main features, recent experimental advances and still unresolved problems in the molecular/atomic mechanism of coupling between the transfer of reducing equivalents and proton translocation in these three protonmotive redox complexes.