Bonsecamin: A New Cyclic Pentapeptide Discovered through Heterologous Expression of a Cryptic Gene Cluster

The intriguing structural complexity of molecules produced by natural organisms is uncontested. Natural scaffolds serve as an important basis for the development of molecules with broad applications, e.g., therapeutics or agrochemicals. Research in recent decades has demonstrated that by means of cl...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Constanze Lasch, Marc Stierhof, Marta Rodríguez Estévez, Maksym Myronovskyi, Josef Zapp, Andriy Luzhetskyy
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: MDPI AG 2021-07-01
Series:Microorganisms
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Online Access:https://www.mdpi.com/2076-2607/9/8/1640
Description
Summary:The intriguing structural complexity of molecules produced by natural organisms is uncontested. Natural scaffolds serve as an important basis for the development of molecules with broad applications, e.g., therapeutics or agrochemicals. Research in recent decades has demonstrated that by means of classic metabolite extraction from microbes only a small portion of natural products can be accessed. The use of genome mining and heterologous expression approaches represents a promising way to discover new natural compounds. In this paper we report the discovery of a novel cyclic pentapeptide called bonsecamin through the heterologous expression of a cryptic NRPS gene cluster from <i>Streptomyces albus</i> ssp. <i>chlorinus</i> NRRL B-24108 in <i>Streptomyces albus</i> Del14. The new compound was successfully isolated and structurally characterized using NMR. The minimal set of genes required for bonsecamin production was determined through bioinformatic analysis and gene deletion experiments. A biosynthetic route leading to the production of bonsecamin is proposed in this paper.
ISSN:2076-2607