Given the widely existing stability-activity trade-off in enzyme evolution, it is still a goal to obtain enzymes embracing both high activity and stability. Herein, we employed an isothermal compressibility (βT) perturbation engineering (ICPE) strategy to comprehensively understand the stability-activity seesaw-like mechanism. The stability and activity of mutants derived from ICPE uncovered a high Pearson correlation (r = 0.93) in a prototypical enzyme T1 lipase. The best variant A186L/L188M/A190Y exhibited a high Tm value up to 78.70 °C, catalytic activity of 474.04 U/mg, and a 73.33% increase in dimethyl sulfoxide resistance compared to the wild type, one of the highest comprehensive performances reported to date. The elastic activation mechanism mediated by conformational change with a ΔβT range of -6.81 × 10-6 to -1.90 × 10-6 bar-1 may account for the balancing of stability and activity to achieve better performing enzymes. The ICPE strategy deepens our understanding of stability-activity trade-off and boosts its applications in enzyme engineering.
Keywords: ICPE strategy; T1 lipase; high hydrostatic pressure molecular dynamics simulations; trade-off.