Biosynthesis of the tunicamycin antibiotics proceeds via unique exo-glycal intermediates.

Journal article

The tunicamycins are archetypal nucleoside antibiotics targeting bacterial peptidoglycan biosynthesis and eukaryotic protein N-glycosylation. Understanding the biosynthesis of their unusual carbon framework may lead to variants with improved selectivity. Here, we demonstrate in vitro recapitulation of key sugar-manipulating enzymes from this pathway. TunA is found to exhibit unusual regioselectivity in the reduction of a key α,β-unsaturated ketone. The product of this reaction is shown to be ...

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Authors: Wyszynski, F; Lee, S; Yabe, T; Wang, H; Gomez-Escribano, J

• Publication status: Published
• Journal: Nature chemistry
• Volume: 4
• Issue: 7
• Pages: 539-546
• Publication date: 2012-07-01
• DOI: 10.1038/nchem.1351
• EISSN: 1755-4349
• ISSN: 1755-4330
• Language: English
• Keywords: Protein Structure, Tertiary; Anti-Bacterial Agents; Ketones; Computational Biology; Pseudomonas aeruginosa; Substrate Specificity; Hydro-Lyases; Carbohydrate Epimerases; Biocatalysis; Multigene Family; Stereoisomerism; Bacterial Proteins; Tunicamycin