Composition Effect of the Outer Layer on the Vesicle Fusion Catalyzed by Phospholipase D

Phospholipase D (PLD) catalyzed the generation of phosphatidic acid (PA) from phosphatidylcholine (PC) at the outer layer of the vesicles prepared through layer by layer via a double emulsion technique. The generation induced a curvature change in the vesicles, which eventually led them to fuse each other. The ratio of two-fatty-acid-tail ethanolamine (PE) to one-fatty-acid-tail ethanolamine (PE) was found to acquire the condition where the mixed-phospholipid vesicles were stable identically with pure two-fatty-acid-tail PC. The effect of the outer-layer mixture on the PLD-induced vesicle fusion was investigated using the fluorescence intensity change. 8-Aminonaph-thalene-1,3,6-trisulfonic acid disodium salt (ANTS) and p-Xylene-bis(N-pyridinium bromide) (DPX) were encapsulated in the vesicles, respectively, for the quantification of the fusion. The fluorescence scale was calibrated with the fluorescence of a 1/1 mixture of ANTS and DPX vesicles in NaCl buffer taken as 100% fluorescence (0% fusion) and the vesicles containing both ANTS and DPX as 0% fluorescence (100% fusion), considering the leakage into the medium studied directly in a separate experiment using vesicles containing both ANTS and DPX. The fusion data for each composition were acquired with the subtraction of the leakage from the quenching. From the monitoring, the vesicle fusion caused by the PLD reaction seems dominantly to occur rather than the vesicle lysis, because the composition effect on the fusion was observed identically with that on the change in the vesicle structure. Furthermore, the diameter measurements also support the fusion dominancy.