Molecular genetic and enzymological techniques have been employed to study antibiotic biosynthesis. The nonproteinogenic amino acid capreomycidine is the signature residue found in the tuberactinomycin family of antitubercular peptide antibiotics and an important element of the pharmacophore. Recombinant VioG, a single module peptide synthetase from the viomycin gene cluster cloned...
The continued propagation of antibiotic resistance requires the development of new therapeutics. The lipopeptide antibiotic enduracidin has demonstrated high activity against Gram-positive pathogens including methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus. In addition to a lack of cross-resistance with existing antibiotic classes, enduracidin has no known transferrable resistance mechanism. The development of enduracidin as...
An enzyme system from cell-free yeast homogenates mediating the
transfer of the methyl group from S-adenosylmethionine-methyl-C¹⁴
or methionine-methyl-C¹⁴ to C-28 of ergosterol has been studied.
The effects of divalent cations, suithydryl inhibitors and reducing
substances on the activity of the enzyme system have been investigated.
It was established that for...
Among the myriad of naturally occurring bioactive compounds are the aminocyclopentitol-containing natural products that represent a family of sugar-derived microbial secondary metabolites, such as the antibiotics pactamycin, allosamidin, and trehazolin. Pactamycin, a structurally unique aminocyclitol antibiotic isolated from Streptomyces pactum, consists of a 5-membered ring aminocyclitol (cyclopentitol) unit, two aromatic...
The isoprenoid pathway is one of the major biosynthetic pathways of secondary metabolites. Isoprenoids with a C₂₀ skeleton are known as diterpenoids and are derived from the common precursor, geranylgeranyl diphosphate (GGPP). This dissertation describes approaches to discover the diterpene synthase enzymes which provide the backbone structures for pleuromutilin and...