Dedicated to Professor Duilio Arigoni on the occasion of his 75th birthdayThe synthesis of some 3-aryl-3-(trifluoromethyl)3H-diazirine and benzophenone-based photoaffinity labels is reported. The photolabile group is bound to a scaffold that also accommodates functional groups to which an indicator unit (biotin) and the bioactive ligand can be attached orthogonally. To three of the labels, moenomycin was conjugated with the aim to provide tools for the identification of the moenomycin binding site within the transglycosylase domain of the enzyme PBP 1b. Some preliminary photoaffinity-labeling experiments were carried out.Introduction. ± Peptidoglycan is an essential cell-wall constituent of almost all eubacteria. It is a heteropolymer consisting of glycan strands cross-linked via short peptide chains. The final events of peptidoglycan biosynthesis at the outside of the cytoplasmic membrane are the formation of the macromolecular architecture by two major types of reaction, i) formation of the polysaccharide strands (transglycosylation) and ii) formation of peptide cross-linkages between the glycan chains (transpeptidation) (for review, see [1]). A representation of the transition state of the transglycosylation reaction is shown in Fig. 1, a [2]. Both the glycosyl donor (the growing peptidoglycan chain) and the glycosyl acceptor (the disaccharide-derived lipid II) (see [1]) are attached to the outer face of the cytoplasmic membrane via a C 55 anchor. The transglycosylation reaction is catalyzed by a number of multimodular bifunctional polymerases (that catalyze also the transpeptidation reaction) designated as class-A high-molecular-mass penicillin-binding proteins (PBPs). Of these, PBP 1b from Escherichia coli has been studied in great detail [3]. It comprises 844 amino acid residues and contains a short cytosolic N-terminus, a membrane span, the D198-G435 glycosyl-transferase module, and the Q447-N844 acyl-transferase module. Within the glycosyl-transferase module, Glu233 has been shown to be central to the transglycosylation, and, in the active site of the acyl transferase, Ser510 is essential, the acylation of which forms the basis of the antibiotic properties of the b-lactams. Recently, the soluble extracellular region of PBP 1b from Streptococcus pneumoniae has been expressed and characterized biochemically [4]. From the most-recent kinetic characterization of the E. coli PBP 1b, it was deduced that a doubly charged metal ion bound to the diphosphate group assists departure of the leaving group, whereas the essential Glu233 acts as a base, removing the proton from the 4-OH group of the glycosyl acceptor (see Fig. 1, a) [5].