Journal
CHEMBIOCHEM
Volume 7, Issue 8, Pages 1231-1240Publisher
WILEY-V C H VERLAG GMBH
DOI: 10.1002/cbic.200600029
Keywords
antibiotics; antitumor agents; biosynthesis; chromobacterium; natural products
Ask authors/readers for more resources
The biosynthetic pathways for violacein and for indolocarbazoles (rebeccamycin, staurosporine) include a decarboxylative fusion of two tryptophan units. However, in the case of violacein, one of the tryptophans experiences on unusual 1 -> 2 shift of the indole ring. The violacein biosynthetic gene cluster was previously reported to consist of four genes, vioABCD. Here we studied the violacein pathway through expression of vio genes in, Escherichia coli and Streptomyces albus. A pair of genes (vioAB), responsible for the earliest steps in violacein biosynthesis, was functionally equivalent to the homologous pair in the indolocarbazole pathway (rebOD), directing the formation of chromopyrrolic acid. However, chromopyrrolic acid appeared to be a shunt product, not a violacein intermediate, In addition to vioABCD, a fifth gene (viOE) was essential for violacein biosynthesis, specifically for production of the characteristic 1 -> 2 shift of the indole ring. We also report new findings on the roles played by the VioC and VioD oxygenases, and on the origin of violacein derivatives of the chromoviridans type.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available