Orthogonal Expression of an Artificial Metalloenzyme for Abiotic Catalysis

Use of engineered cytochromes P450 for accelerating drug discovery and development

Numerous steps in drug development, including the generation of authentic metabolites and late-stage functionalization of candidates, necessitate the modification of often complex molecules, such as natural products. While it can be challenging to make the required regio- and stereoselective alterations to a molecule using purely chemical catalysis, enzymes can introduce changes to complex molecules with a high degree of stereo- and regioselectivity. Cytochrome P450 enzymes are biocatalysts of unequalled versatility, capable of regio- and stereoselective functionalization of unactivated CH bonds by monooxygenation. Collectively they catalyze over 60 different biotransformations on structurally and functionally diverse organic molecules, including natural products, drugs, steroids, organic acids and other lipophilic molecules. This catalytic versatility and substrate range makes them likely candidates for application as potential biocatalysts for industrial chemistry. However, several aspects of the P450 catalytic cycle and other characteristics have limited their implementation to date in industry, including: their lability at elevated temperature, in the presence of solvents, and over lengthy incubation times; the typically low efficiency with which they metabolize non-natural substrates; and their lack of specificity for a single metabolic pathway. Protein engineering by rational design or directed evolution provides a way to engineer P450s for industrial use. Here we review the progress made to date toward engineering the properties of P450s, especially eukaryotic forms, for industrial application, and including the recent expansion of their catalytic repertoire to include non-natural reactions.

Organometallic catalysis in aqueous and biological environments: harnessing the power of metal carbenes

Translating the power of transition metal catalysis to the native habitats of enzymes can significantly expand the possibilities of interrogating or manipulating natural biological systems, including living cells and organisms. This is especially relevant for organometallic reactions that have shown great potential in the field of organic synthesis, like the metal-catalyzed transfer of carbenes. While, at first sight, performing metal carbene chemistry in aqueous solvents, and especially in biologically relevant mixtures, does not seem obvious, in recent years there has been a growing number of reports demonstrating the feasibility of the task. Either using small molecule metal catalysts or artificial metalloenzymes, a number of carbene transfer reactions that tolerate aqueous and biorelevant media are being developed. This review intends to summarize the most relevant contributions, and establish the state of the art in this emerging research field.

Assembly and Evolution of Artificial Metalloenzymes within E. coli Nissle 1917 for Enantioselective and Site-Selective Functionalization of C─H and C═C Bonds

The potential applications afforded by the generation and reactivity of artificial metalloenzymes (ArMs) in microorganisms are vast. We show that a non-pathogenic E. coli strain, Nissle 1917 (EcN), is a suitable host for the creation of ArMs from cytochrome P450s and artificial heme cofactors. An outer-membrane receptor in EcN transports an iridium porphyrin into the cell, and the Ir-CYP119 (CYP119 containing iridium porphyrin) assembled in vivo catalyzes carbene insertions into benzylic C-H bonds enantioselectively and site-selectively. The application of EcN as a whole-cell screening platform eliminates the need for laborious processing procedures, drastically increases the ease and throughput of screening, and accelerates the development of Ir-CYP119 with improved catalytic properties. Studies to identify the transport machinery suggest that a transporter different from the previously assumed ChuA receptor serves to usher the iridium porphyrin into the cytoplasm.

Unnatural biosynthesis by an engineered microorganism with heterologously expressed natural enzymes and an artificial metalloenzyme

Synthetic biology enables microbial hosts to produce complex molecules that are otherwise produced by organisms that are rare or difficult to cultivate, but the structures of these molecules are limited to those formed by chemical reactions catalyzed by natural enzymes. The integration of artificial metalloenzymes (ArMs) that catalyze unnatural reactions into metabolic networks could broaden the cache of molecules produced biosynthetically by microorganisms. We report an engineered microbial cell expressing a heterologous biosynthetic pathway, which contains both natural enzymes and ArMs, that produces an unnatural product with high diastereoselectivity. To create this hybrid biosynthetic organism, we engineered Escherichia coli (E. coli) with a heterologous terpene biosynthetic pathway and an ArM containing an iridium-porphyrin complex that was transported into the cell with a heterologous transport system. We improved the diastereoselectivity and product titer of the unnatural product by evolving the ArM and selecting the appropriate gene induction and cultivation conditions. This work shows that synthetic biology and synthetic chemistry can produce, together with natural and artificial enzymes in whole cells, molecules that were previously inaccessible to nature.

In Vivo Assembly of Artificial Metalloenzymes and Application in Whole-Cell Biocatalysis*

We report the supramolecular assembly of artificial metalloenzymes (ArMs), based on the Lactococcal multidrug resistance regulator (LmrR) and an exogeneous copper(II)-phenanthroline complex, in the cytoplasm of E. coli cells. A combination of catalysis, cell-fractionation, and inhibitor experiments, supplemented with in-cell solid-state NMR spectroscopy, confirmed the in-cell assembly. The ArM-containing whole cells were active in the catalysis of the enantioselective Friedel-Crafts alkylation of indoles and the Diels-Alder reaction of azachalcone with cyclopentadiene. Directed evolution resulted in two different improved mutants for both reactions, LmrR_A92E_M8D and LmrR_A92E_V15A, respectively. The whole-cell ArM system required no engineering of the microbial host, the protein scaffold, or the cofactor to achieve ArM assembly and catalysis. We consider this a key step towards integrating abiological catalysis with biosynthesis to generate a hybrid metabolism.

Cell mimicry as a bottom-up strategy for hierarchical engineering of nature-inspired entities

Artificial biology is an emerging concept that aims to design and engineer the structure and function of natural cells, organelles, or biomolecules with a combination of biological and abiotic building blocks. Cell mimicry focuses on concepts that have the potential to be integrated with mammalian cells and tissue. In this feature article, we will emphasize the advancements in the past 3-4 years (2017-present) that are dedicated to artificial enzymes, artificial organelles, and artificial mammalian cells. Each aspect will be briefly introduced, followed by highlighting efforts that considered key properties of the different mimics. Finally, the current challenges and opportunities will be outlined. This article is categorized under: Nanotechnology Approaches to Biology > Nanoscale Systems in Biology.

Designer metalloenzymes for synthetic biology: Enzyme hybrids for catalysis

Combining organometallics and biology has generated broad interest from scientists working on applications from in situ drug release to biocatalysis. Engineered enzymes and biohybrid catalysts (also referred to as artificial enzymes) have introduced a wide range of abiotic chemistry into biocatalysis. Predominantly, this work has concentrated on using these catalysts for single step in vitro reactions. However, the promise of using these hybrid catalysts in vivo and combining them with synthetic biology and metabolic engineering is vast. This report will briefly review recent advances in artificial metalloenzyme design, followed by summarising recent studies that have looked at the use of these hybrid catalysts in vivo and in enzymatic cascades, therefore exploring their potential for synthetic biology.

The Red Color of Life Transformed - Synthetic Advances and Emerging Applications of Protoporphyrin IX in Chemical Biology

Protoporphyrin IX (PPIX) is the porphyrin scaffold of heme b, a ubiquitous prosthetic group of proteins responsible for oxygen binding (hemoglobin, myoglobin), electron transfer (cytochrome c) and catalysis (cytochrome P450, catalases, peroxidases). PPIX and its metallated derivatives frequently find application as therapeutic agents, imaging tools, catalysts, sensors and in light harvesting. The vast toolkit of accessible porphyrin functionalization reactions enables easy synthetic modification of PPIX to meet the requirements for its multiple uses. In the past few years, particular interest has arisen in exploiting the interaction of PPIX and its synthetic derivatives with biomolecules such as DNA and heme-binding proteins to evolve molecular devices with new functions as well as to uncover potential therapeutic toeholds. This review strives to shine a light on the most recent developments in the synthetic chemistry of PPIX and its uses in selected fields of chemical biology.

Crystals in Minutes: Instant On-Site Microcrystallisation of Various Flavours of the CYP102A1 (P450BM3) Haem Domain

Despite CYP102A1 (P450BM3) representing one of the most extensively researched metalloenzymes, crystallisation of its haem domain upon modification can be a challenge. Crystal structures are indispensable for the efficient structure-based design of P450BM3 as a biocatalyst. The abietane diterpenoid derivative N-abietoyl-l-tryptophan (AbiATrp) is an outstanding crystallisation accelerator for the wild-type P450BM3 haem domain, with visible crystals forming within 2 hours and diffracting to a near-atomic resolution of 1.22 Å. Using these crystals as seeds in a cross-microseeding approach, an assortment of P450BM3 haem domain crystal structures, containing previously uncrystallisable decoy molecules and diverse artificial metalloporphyrins binding various ligand molecules, as well as heavily tagged haem-domain variants, could be determined. Some of the structures reported herein could be used as models of different stages of the P450BM3 catalytic cycle.

Recent advances in the field of artificial hemoproteins: New efficient eco-compatible biocatalysts for nitrene-, oxene- and carbene-transfer reactions

In the last few years, the field of artificial hemoproteins has been expanding through two main strategies involving either the incorporation of synthetic metalloporphyrin derivatives into the chiral cavity of a protein or the directed evolution of natural hemoproteins such as myoglobin and cytochromes P450. First, various synthetic water-soluble porphyrins including ions of transition metals such as iron and manganese have been inserted covalently or by supramolecular anchoring into non-specifically designed native proteins or into proteins modified by a minimum number of mutations. The obtained artificial hemoproteins were able to catalyze oxene transfer reactions such as epoxidation of alkenes or sulfoxidation of sulfides and cyclopropanation reactions with good activities and moderate enantioselectivities. Recently, a second approach, based on the design of the active site of already existing native hemoproteins such as myoglobin and cytochromes P450 by directed evolution, has led to new artificial hemoproteins that are able to catalyze oxene transfer reactions with improved activities as well as with abiological reactions. This approach thus provided promising tools for the catalysis of reactions such as intramolecular or intermolecular carbene and nitrene transfer reactions with high efficiencies. In addition, in all cases, after a few rounds of mutagenesis, mutants that were able to catalyze those reactions with a high enantioselectivity could be obtained. Finally, several groups showed that these new artificial metalloenzymes could also be used for the preparative scale-production of compounds with an excellent enantioselectivity, opening new pathways for the industrial synthesis of compounds of pharmaceutical interest.

Iron catalysts with N-ligands for carbene transfer of diazo reagents

This review provides an overview of the catalytic activity of iron complexes of nitrogen ligands in driving carbene transfers towards CC, C–H and X–H bonds. The reactivity of diazo reagents is discussed as well as the proposed reaction mechanisms.

Unlocking the therapeutic potential of artificial metalloenzymes

In order to harness the functionality of metals, nature has evolved over billions of years to utilize metalloproteins as key components in numerous cellular processes. Despite this, transition metals such as ruthenium, palladium, iridium, and gold are largely absent from naturally occurring metalloproteins, likely due to their scarcity as precious metals. To mimic the evolutionary process of nature, the field of artificial metalloenzymes (ArMs) was born as a way to benefit from the unique chemoselectivity and orthogonality of transition metals in a biological setting. In its current state, numerous examples have successfully incorporated transition metals into a variety of protein scaffolds. Using these ArMs, many examples of new-to-nature reactions have been carried out, some of which have shown substantial biocompatibility. Given the rapid rate at which this field is growing, this review aims to highlight some important studies that have begun to take the next step within this field; namely the development of ArM-centered drug therapies or biotechnological tools.

Expansion of Redox Chemistry in Designer Metalloenzymes

Many artificial enzymes that catalyze redox reactions have important energy, environmental, and medical applications. Native metalloenzymes use a set of redox-active amino acids and cofactors as redox centers, with a potential range between -700 and +800 mV versus standard hydrogen electrode (SHE, all reduction potentials are versus SHE). The redox potentials and the orientation of redox centers in native metalloproteins are optimal for their redox chemistry. However, the limited number and potential range of native redox centers challenge the design and optimization of novel redox chemistry in metalloenzymes. Artificial metalloenzymes use non-native redox centers and could go far beyond the natural range of redox potentials for novel redox chemistry. In addition to designing protein monomers, strategies for increasing the electron transfer rate in self-assembled protein complexes and protein-electrode or -nanomaterial interfaces will be discussed. Redox reactions in proteins occur on redox active amino acid residues (Tyr, Trp, Met, Cys, etc.) and cofactors (iron sulfur clusters, flavin, heme, etc.). The redox potential of these redox centers cover a ∼1.5 V range and is optimized for their specific functions. Despite recent progress, tuning the redox potential for amino acid residues or cofactors remains challenging. Many redox-active unnatural amino acids (UAAs) can be incorporated into protein via genetic codon expansion. Their redox potentials extend the range of physiologically relevant potentials. Indeed, installing new redox cofactors with fined-tuned redox potentials is essential for designing novel redox enzymes. By combining UAA and redox cofactor incorporation, we harnessed light energy to reduce CO₂ in a fluorescent protein, mimicking photosynthetic apparatus in nature. Manipulating the position and reduction potential of redox centers inside proteins is important for optimizing the electron transfer rate and the activity of artificial enzymes. Learning from the native electron transfer complex, protein-protein interactions can be enhanced by increasing the electrostatic interaction between proteins. An artificial oxidase showed close to native enzyme activity with optimized interaction with electron transfer partner and increased electron transfer efficiency. In addition to the de novo design of protein-protein interaction, protein self-assembly methods using scaffolds, such as proliferating cell nuclear antigen, to efficiently anchor enzymes and their redox partners. The self-assembly process enhances electron transfer efficiency and enzyme activity by bringing redox centers into close proximity of each other. In addition to protein self-assembly, protein-electrode or protein-nanomaterial self-assembly can also promote efficient electron transfer from inorganic materials to enzyme active sites. Such hybrid systems combine the efficiency of enzyme reactions and the robustness of electrodes or nanomaterials, often with advantageous catalytic activities. By combining these strategies, we can not only mimic some of nature's most fascinating reactions, such as photosynthesis and aerobic respiration, but also transcend nature toward environmental, energy, and health applications.

Noble-Metal Substitution in Hemoproteins: An Emerging Strategy for Abiological Catalysis

Enzymes have evolved to catalyze a range of biochemical transformations with high efficiencies and unparalleled selectivities, including stereoselectivities, regioselectivities, chemoselectivities, and substrate selectivities, while typically operating under mild aqueous conditions. These properties have motivated extensive research to identify or create enzymes with reactivity that complements or even surpasses the reactivity of small-molecule catalysts for chemical reactions. One of the limitations preventing the wider use of enzymes in chemical synthesis, however, is the narrow range of bond constructions catalyzed by native enzymes. One strategy to overcome this limitation is to create artificial metalloenzymes (ArMs) that combine the molecular recognition of nature with the reactivity discovered by chemists. This Account describes a new approach for generating ArMs by the formal replacement of the natural iron found in the porphyrin IX (PIX) of hemoproteins with noble metals. Analytical techniques coupled with studies of chemical reactivity have demonstrated that expression of apomyoglobins and apocytochrome P450s (for which "apo-" denotes the cofactor-free protein) followed by reconstitution with metal-PIX cofactors in vitro creates proteins with little perturbation of the native structure, suggesting that the cofactors likely reside within the native active site. By means of this metal substitution strategy, a large number of ArMs have been constructed that contain varying metalloporphyrins and mutations of the protein. The studies discussed in this Account encompass the use of ArMs containing noble metals to catalyze a range of abiological transformations with high chemoselectivity, enantioselectivity, diastereoselectivity, and regioselectivity. These transformations include intramolecular and intermolecular insertion of carbenes into C-H, N-H, and S-H bonds, cyclopropanation of vinylarenes and of internal and nonconjugated alkenes, and intramolecular insertions of nitrenes into C-H bonds. The rates of intramolecular insertions into C-H bonds catalyzed by thermophilic P450 enzymes reconstituted with an Ir(Me)-PIX cofactor are now comparable to the rates of reactions catalyzed by native enzymes and, to date, 1000 times greater than those of any previously reported ArM. This reactivity also encompasses the selective intermolecular insertion of the carbene from ethyl diazoacetate into C-H bonds over dimerization of the carbene to form alkenes, a class of carbene insertion or selectivity not reported to occur with small-molecule catalysts. These combined results highlight the potential of well-designed ArMs to catalyze abiological transformations that have been challenging to achieve with any type of catalyst. The metal substitution strategy described herein should complement the reactivity of native enzymes and expand the scope of enzyme-catalyzed reactions.

Highly Diastereo- and Enantioselective Synthesis of Nitrile-Substituted Cyclopropanes by Myoglobin-Mediated Carbene Transfer Catalysis

A chemobiocatalytic strategy for the highly stereoselective synthesis of nitrile-substituted cyclopropanes is reported. The present approach relies on an asymmetric olefin cyclopropanation reaction catalyzed by an engineered myoglobin in the presence of ex situ generated diazoacetonitrile within a compartmentalized reaction system. This method enabled the efficient transformation of a broad range of olefin substrates at a preparative scale with up to 99.9 % de and ee and up to 5600 turnovers. The enzymatic product could be further elaborated to afford a variety of functionalized chiral cyclopropanes. This work expands the range of synthetically valuable, abiotic transformations accessible through biocatalysis and paves the way to the practical and safe exploitation of diazoacetonitrile in biocatalytic carbene transfer reactions.

Myoglobin-Catalyzed C-H Functionalization of Unprotected Indoles

Functionalized indoles are recurrent motifs in bioactive natural products and pharmaceuticals. While transition metal-catalyzed carbene transfer has provided an attractive route to afford C3-functionalized indoles, these protocols are viable only in the presence of N-protected indoles, owing to competition from the more facile N-H insertion reaction. Herein, a biocatalytic strategy for enabling the direct C-H functionalization of unprotected indoles is reported. Engineered variants of myoglobin provide efficient biocatalysts for this reaction, which has no precedents in the biological world, enabling the transformation of a broad range of indoles in the presence of ethyl α-diazoacetate to give the corresponding C3-functionalized derivatives in high conversion yields and excellent chemoselectivity. This strategy could be exploited to develop a concise chemoenzymatic route to afford the nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug indomethacin.

Chemoselective Cyclopropanation over Carbene Y-H Insertion Catalyzed by an Engineered Carbene Transferase

Hemoproteins have recently emerged as promising biocatalysts for promoting a variety of carbene transfer reactions including cyclopropanation and Y-H insertion (Y = N, S, Si, B). For these and synthetic carbene transfer catalysts alike, achieving high chemoselectivity toward cyclopropanation in olefin substrates bearing unprotected Y-H groups has proven remarkably challenging due to competition from the more facile carbene Y-H insertion reaction. In this report, we describe the development of a novel artificial metalloenzyme based on an engineered myoglobin incorporating a serine-ligated Co-porphyrin cofactor that is capable of offering high selectivity toward olefin cyclopropanation over N-H and Si-H insertion. Intramolecular competition experiments revealed a distinct and dramatically altered chemoselectivity of the Mb(H64V,V68A,H93S)[Co(ppIX)] variant in carbene transfer reactions compared to myoglobin-based variants containing the native histidine-ligated heme cofactor or other metal/proximal ligand substitutions. These studies highlight the functional plasticity of myoglobin as a "carbene transferase" and illustrate how modulation of the cofactor environment within this metalloprotein scaffold represents a valuable strategy for accessing carbene transfer reactivity not exhibited by naturally occurring hemoproteins or transition metal catalysts.

Diverse Engineered Heme Proteins Enable Stereodivergent Cyclopropanation of Unactivated Alkenes

Developing catalysts that produce each stereoisomer of a desired product selectively is a longstanding synthetic challenge. Biochemists have addressed this challenge by screening nature's diversity to discover enzymes that catalyze the formation of complementary stereoisomers. We show here that the same approach can be applied to a new-to-nature enzymatic reaction, alkene cyclopropanation via carbene transfer. By screening diverse native and engineered heme proteins, we identified globins and serine-ligated "P411" variants of cytochromes P450 with promiscuous activity for cyclopropanation of unactivated alkene substrates. We then enhanced their activities and stereoselectivities by directed evolution: just 1-3 rounds of site-saturation mutagenesis and screening generated enzymes that transform unactivated alkenes and electron-deficient alkenes into each of the four stereoisomeric cyclopropanes with up to 5,400 total turnovers and 98% enantiomeric excess. These fully genetically encoded biocatalysts function in whole Escherichia coli cells in mild, aqueous conditions and provide the first example of enantioselective, intermolecular iron-catalyzed cyclopropanation of unactivated alkenes.

Scope and limitations of carbohydrate hydrolysis for de novo glycan sequencing using a hydrogen peroxide/metallopeptide-based glycosidase mimetic

Acidic hydrolysis is commonly used as a first step to break down oligo- and polysaccharides into monosaccharide units for structural analysis. While easy to set up and amenable to mass spectrometry detection, acid hydrolysis is not without its drawbacks. For example, ring-destruction side reactions and degradation products, along with difficulties in optimizing conditions from analyte to analyte, greatly limits its broad utility. Herein we report studies on a hydrogen peroxide/CuGGH metallopeptide-based glycosidase mimetic design for a more efficient and controllable carbohydrate hydrolysis. A library of methyl glycosides consisting of ten common monosaccharide substrates, along with oligosaccharide substrates, was screened with the artificial glycosidase for hydrolytic activity in a high-throughput format with a robotic liquid handling system. The artificial glycosidase was found to be active towards most screened linkages, including alpha- and beta-anomers, thus serving as a potential alternative method for traditional acidic hydrolysis approaches of oligosaccharides.