The cyclization of sedoheptulose 7-phosphate to 2-epi-5-epi-valiolone, catalyzed by the 2-epi-5-epi-valiolone synthases, is the first committed step in the biosynthesis of C( 7 )N-aminocyclitol-containing natural products, such as validamycin and acarbose. These natural products contain in their structures a valienamine unit, which is important for their biological activity. The same core unit is also found in salbostatin, a related pseudodisaccharide that has strong trehalase inhibitory activity. In silico analysis of the putative biosynthetic gene cluster of salbostatin from Streptomyces albus ATCC 21838 revealed 20 open reading frames, including an acbC homolog gene (salQ), which is believed to be involved in the biosynthesis of salbostatin. The salQ gene was overexpressed in Escherichia coli and the catalytic function of the recombinant protein was confirmed to be a 2-epi-5-epi-valiolone synthase. In addition, SalF, SalL, SalM, SalN, SalO, and SalR were found to be homologous to AcbR, AcbM, AcbL, AcbN, AcbO, and AcbP from the acarbose pathway, respectively, which suggests that the biosynthesis of C(7)N-aminocyclitol moiety of salbostatin may be very similar to that of acarbose.
The skc gene encoding streptokinase (SK) with a molecular mass of approximately 47.4 kDa was cloned from Streptococcus equisimilis ATCC 9542 and heterologously overexpressed in Streptomyces lividans TK24 and E. coli using various strong promoters. When the promoter for sprT [Streptomyces griseus trypsin (SGT)] was used in the host S. lividans TK24, a 47.4-kDa protein was detected along with a smaller hydrolyzed protein (44 kDa), suggesting that posttranslational hydrolysis had occurred as has been reported in other expression systems. The casein/plasminogen plate assay revealed that the plasmid construct containing the SGT signal peptide was superior to that containing the SK signal peptide in terms of SK production. Maximal production of SK was calculated to be about 0.25 unit/ml of culture broth, a value that was five times higher than that obtained with other expression systems using ermE and tipA promoters in the same host. When the skc gene was expressed in E. coli BL21(∆DE3)pLys under the control of the T7 promoter, a relatively large amount of SK was expressed in soluble form without hydrolysis. SK activity in E. coli/pET28a-T7 p SK m was more than 2 units/ml of culture broth, even though about half of the expressed protein formed an inactive inclusion body.
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