title: Engineered biosynthesis of the antiparasitic agent frenolicin B and rationally designed analogs in a heterologous host.
abstract: The polyketide antibiotic frenolicin B harbors a biosynthetically intriguing benzoisochromanequinone core, and has been shown to exhibit promising antiparasitic activity against Eimeria tenella. To facilitate further exploration of its chemistry and biology, we constructed a biosynthetic route to frenolicin B in the heterologous host Streptomyces coelicolor CH999, despite the absence of key enzymes in the identified frenolicin gene cluster. Together with our understanding of the underlying polyketide biosynthetic pathway, this heterologous production system was exploited to produce analogs modified at the C15 position. Both the natural product and these analogs inhibited the growth of Toxoplasma gondii in a manner that reveals sensitivity to the length of the C15 substituent. The ability to construct a functional biosynthetic pathway, despite a lack of genetic information, illustrates the feasibility of a modular approach to engineering medicinally relevant polyketide products.
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305, USA.
authors.forename: Jay T
authors.initials: JT
authors.lastname: Fitzgerald
authors.forename: Christian P
authors.initials: CP
authors.lastname: Ridley
authors.forename: Chaitan
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Khosla
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D000977:Antiparasitic Agents / Q000737:chemistry / Q000378:metabolism* / Q000494:pharmacology; D002460:Cell Line; D003001:Cloning, Molecular; D005818:Genetic Engineering / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D009682:Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy; D009285:Naphthoquinones / Q000737:chemistry / Q000378:metabolism / Q000494:pharmacology; D048372:Streptomyces coelicolor / Q000201:enzymology / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism*; D014122:Toxoplasma / Q000187:drug effects / Q000254:growth & development; D000095622:Benzoisochromanequinones
chemical_list: D000977:Antiparasitic Agents; D009285:Naphthoquinones; C018066:frenolicin B; D000095622:Benzoisochromanequinones