Identification of pro-drug type ACE inhibitory peptide sourced from porcine myosin B: Evaluation of its antihypertensive effects in vivo

This study aimed to identify a novel angiotensin I-converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitory peptide from porcine skeletal myosin B. Proteins were hydrolyzed with pepsin and the hydrolysates were then subjected to various types of chromatography to isolate the active peptides. The 50% inhibitory concentrations of Lys–Arg–Val–Ile–Gln–Try (M6 a novel peptide) and Val–Lys–Ala–Gly–Phe (A5, a peptide discovered by Ukeda et al. (1991)) were 6.1 and 20.3 μM, respectively. As a result of a homology search, it was determined that the M6 peptide originated from myosin and peptide A5 was of actin origin. M6 is a novel ACE inhibitory peptide, whose activity was shown to be the strongest amongst the previously published myosin-originated peptides. Kinetic evaluations showed that both peptides are competitive inhibitors of ACE. Based on their activity against ACE, M6 was classified as a pro-drug conformer and A5 was classified as a substrate conformer. When both peptides were administered orally to spontaneously hypertensive rats at doses of 10 mg/kg, temporal hypertension was observed after 6 h. This study suggests that M6 and A5 are peptides that may serve several purposes. Based on their remarkable antihypertensive activity, we suggest that M6 and A5 may have potential applications as functional food, which could be used as nutraceutical compounds.