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Richter D, Piel J. Novel types of RiPP-modifying enzymes. Curr Opin Chem Biol 2024; 80:102463. [PMID: 38729090 DOI: 10.1016/j.cbpa.2024.102463] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/28/2024] [Revised: 04/12/2024] [Accepted: 04/14/2024] [Indexed: 05/12/2024]
Abstract
Novel discoveries in natural product biosynthesis reveal hidden bioactive compounds and expand our knowledge in enzymology. Ribosomally synthesized and post-translationally modified peptides (RiPPs) are a rapidly growing class of natural products featuring diverse non-canonical amino acids introduced by maturation enzymes as a class-defining characteristic. Underexplored RiPP sources, such as the human microbiome, the oceans, uncultured microorganisms, and plants are rich hunting grounds for novel enzymology. Unusual α- and β-amino acids, peptide cleavages, lipidations, diverse macrocyclizations, and other features expand the range of chemical groups that are installed in RiPPs by often promiscuous enzymes. This review highlights the search for novelty in RiPP enzymology in the past two years, with respect to the discovery of new biochemical modifications but also towards novel applications.
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Affiliation(s)
- Daniel Richter
- Institute of Microbiology, Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule (ETH) Zürich, Vladimir-Prelog-Weg 4, 8093 Zürich, Switzerland
| | - Jörn Piel
- Institute of Microbiology, Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule (ETH) Zürich, Vladimir-Prelog-Weg 4, 8093 Zürich, Switzerland.
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2
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Eslami SM, van der Donk WA. Proteases Involved in Leader Peptide Removal during RiPP Biosynthesis. ACS BIO & MED CHEM AU 2024; 4:20-36. [PMID: 38404746 PMCID: PMC10885120 DOI: 10.1021/acsbiomedchemau.3c00059] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/31/2023] [Revised: 11/13/2023] [Accepted: 11/14/2023] [Indexed: 02/27/2024]
Abstract
Ribosomally synthesized and post-translationally modified peptides (RiPPs) have received much attention in recent years because of their promising bioactivities and the portability of their biosynthetic pathways. Heterologous expression studies of RiPP biosynthetic enzymes identified by genome mining often leave a leader peptide on the final product to prevent toxicity to the host and to allow the attachment of a genetically encoded affinity purification tag. Removal of the leader peptide to produce the mature natural product is then carried out in vitro with either a commercial protease or a protease that fulfills this task in the producing organism. This review covers the advances in characterizing these latter cognate proteases from bacterial RiPPs and their utility as sequence-dependent proteases. The strategies employed for leader peptide removal have been shown to be remarkably diverse. They include one-step removal by a single protease, two-step removal by two dedicated proteases, and endoproteinase activity followed by aminopeptidase activity by the same protease. Similarly, the localization of the proteolytic step varies from cytoplasmic cleavage to leader peptide removal during secretion to extracellular leader peptide removal. Finally, substrate recognition ranges from highly sequence specific with respect to the leader and/or modified core peptide to nonsequence specific mechanisms.
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Affiliation(s)
- Sara M. Eslami
- Department
of Chemistry, University of Illinois at
Urbana−Champaign, Urbana, Illinois 61801, United States
| | - Wilfred A. van der Donk
- Department
of Chemistry, University of Illinois at
Urbana−Champaign, Urbana, Illinois 61801, United States
- Howard
Hughes Medical Institute, University of
Illinois at Urbana−Champaign, Urbana, Illinois 61801, United States
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3
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Li H, Ding W, Zhang Q. Discovery and engineering of ribosomally synthesized and post-translationally modified peptide (RiPP) natural products. RSC Chem Biol 2024; 5:90-108. [PMID: 38333193 PMCID: PMC10849128 DOI: 10.1039/d3cb00172e] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/07/2023] [Accepted: 11/17/2023] [Indexed: 02/10/2024] Open
Abstract
Ribosomally synthesized and post-translationally modified peptides (RiPPs) represent a diverse superfamily of natural products with immense potential for drug development. This review provides a concise overview of the recent advances in the discovery of RiPP natural products, focusing on rational strategies such as bioactivity guided screening, enzyme or precursor-based genome mining, and biosynthetic engineering. The challenges associated with activating silent biosynthetic gene clusters and the development of elaborate catalytic systems are also discussed. The logical frameworks emerging from these research studies offer valuable insights into RiPP biosynthesis and engineering, paving the way for broader pharmaceutic applications of these peptide natural products.
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Affiliation(s)
- He Li
- Department of Chemistry, Fudan University Shanghai 200433 China
| | - Wei Ding
- State Key Laboratory of Microbial Metabolism, School of Life Sciences & Biotechnology, Shanghai Jiao Tong University Shanghai 200240 China
| | - Qi Zhang
- Department of Chemistry, Fudan University Shanghai 200433 China
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Cao L, Do T, Zhu A, Duan J, Alam N, Link AJ. Genome Mining and Discovery of Imiditides, a Family of RiPPs with a Class-Defining Aspartimide Modification. J Am Chem Soc 2023; 145:18834-18845. [PMID: 37595015 PMCID: PMC10947588 DOI: 10.1021/jacs.3c03991] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 08/20/2023]
Abstract
Ribosomally synthesized and post-translationally modified peptides (RiPPs) are a large and diverse class of natural products of ribosomal origin. In the past decade, various sophisticated machine-learning-based software packages have been established to discover novel RiPPs that do not resemble the known families. Here, we show that tailoring enzymes that cluster with various RiPP families can serve as effective bioinformatic seeds, providing a complementary approach for novel RiPP discovery. Leveraging the fact that O-methyltransferases homologous to protein isoaspartyl methyltransferases (PIMTs) are associated with lasso peptide, graspetide, and lanthipeptide biosynthetic gene clusters (BGCs), we utilized a C-terminal motif unique to RiPP-associated O-methyltransferases as the search query to discover a novel family of RiPPs, the imiditides. Our genome-mining algorithm reveals a total of 670 imiditide BGCs, distributed across Gram-positive bacterial genomes. In addition, we demonstrate the heterologous production of the founding member of the imiditide family, mNmaAM, encoded in the genome of Nonomuraea maritima. In contrast to other RiPP-associated PIMTs that recognize constrained peptides as substrates, the PIMT homologue in the mNmaAM BGC, NmaM, methylates a specific Asp residue on the linear precursor peptide, NmaA. The methyl ester is then turned into an aspartimide spontaneously. Substrate specificity is achieved by extensive charge-charge interactions between the precursor NmaA and the modifying enzyme NmaM suggested by both experiments and an AlphaFold model prediction. Our study shows that PIMT-mediated aspartimide formation is an emerging backbone modification strategy in the biosynthesis of multiple RiPP families.
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Affiliation(s)
- Li Cao
- Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544, United States
| | - Truc Do
- Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544, United States
| | - Angela Zhu
- Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544, United States
| | - Jianshu Duan
- Department of Geosciences, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544, United States
| | - Nathan Alam
- Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544, United States
| | - A. James Link
- Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544, United States
- Department of Chemistry, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544, United States
- Department of Molecular Biology, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544, United States
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5
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Liu S, Nie Q, Liu Z, Patil S, Gao X. Fungal P450 Deconstructs the 2,5-Diazabicyclo[2.2.2]octane Ring En Route to the Complete Biosynthesis of 21 R-Citrinadin A. J Am Chem Soc 2023; 145:14251-14259. [PMID: 37352463 PMCID: PMC11025717 DOI: 10.1021/jacs.3c02109] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 06/25/2023]
Abstract
Prenylated indole alkaloids (PIAs) possess great structural diversity and show biological activities. Despite significant efforts in investigating the biosynthetic mechanism, the key step in the transformation of 2,5-diazabicyclo[2.2.2]octane-containing PIAs into a distinct class of pentacyclic compounds remains unknown. Here, using a combination of gene deletion, heterologous expression, and biochemical characterization, we show that a unique fungal P450 enzyme CtdY catalyzes the cleavage of the amide bond in the 2,5-diazabicyclo[2.2.2]octane system, followed by a decarboxylation step to form the 6/5/5/6/6 pentacyclic ring in 21R-citrinadin A. We also demonstrate the function of a subsequent cascade of stereospecific oxygenases to further modify the 6/5/5/6/6 pentacyclic intermediate en route to the complete 21R-citrinadin A biosynthesis. Our findings reveal a key enzyme CtdY for the pathway divergence in the biosynthesis of PIAs and uncover the complex late-stage post-translational modifications in 21R-citrinadin A biosynthesis.
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Affiliation(s)
- Shuai Liu
- Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, Rice University, Houston, Texas 77005, USA
| | - Qiuyue Nie
- Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, Rice University, Houston, Texas 77005, USA
| | - Zhiwen Liu
- Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, Rice University, Houston, Texas 77005, USA
| | - Siddhant Patil
- Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, Rice University, Houston, Texas 77005, USA
| | - Xue Gao
- Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, Rice University, Houston, Texas 77005, USA
- Department of Bioengineering, Rice University, Houston, TX 77005, USA
- Department of Chemistry, Rice University, Houston, TX 77005, USA
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Cao L, Do T, Zhu AD, Alam N, Link AJ. Genome Mining and Discovery of Imiditides, a Novel Family of RiPPs with a Class-defining Aspartimide Modification. BIORXIV : THE PREPRINT SERVER FOR BIOLOGY 2023:2023.04.07.536058. [PMID: 37066262 PMCID: PMC10104114 DOI: 10.1101/2023.04.07.536058] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 04/18/2023]
Abstract
Ribosomally synthesized and post-translationally modified peptides (RiPPs) are a fascinating class of natural products of ribosomal origins. In the past decade, various sophisticated machine learning-based software packages have been established to discover novel RiPPs that do not resemble the known families. Instead, we argue that tailoring enzymes that cluster with various RiPP families can serve as effective bioinformatic seeds for novel RiPP discovery. Leveraging that O -methyltransferases homologous to protein isoaspartyl methyltransferases (PIMTs) are associated with lasso peptide, graspetide, and lanthipeptide biosynthetic gene clusters (BGCs), we utilized the C-terminal motif unique to RiPP-associated O -methyltransferases as the search query to discover a novel family of RiPPs, imiditides. Our genome-mining algorithm reveals a total of 670 imiditide BGCs, widely distributed in Gram-positive bacterial genomes. In addition, we demonstrate the heterologous production of the founding member of the imiditide family, mNmaA M , encoded in the genome of Nonomuraea maritima . In contrast to other RiPP associated PIMTs that recognize constrained peptides as substrates, the PIMT homolog in mNmaA M BGC, NmaM, methylates a specific Asp residue on the linear precursor peptide, NmaA. The methyl ester is then turned into an aspartimide spontaneously. The aspartimide moiety formed is unusually stable, leading to the accumulation of the aspartimidylated product in vivo . The substrate specificity is achieved by extensive charge-charge interactions between the precursor NmaA and the modifying enzyme NmaM suggested by both experimental validations as well as an AlphaFold model prediction. Our study suggests that PIMT-mediated aspartimide formation is an underappreciated backbone modification strategy in RiPP biosynthesis, compared to the well-studied backbone rigidification chemistries, such as thiazol(in)e and oxazol(in)e formations. Additionally, our findings suggest that aspartimide formation in Gram-positive bacterial proteomes are not limited to spontaneous protein aging and degradation. TOC Figure
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7
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Koehnke J. Caught in the act. Nat Chem Biol 2023; 19:7-8. [PMID: 36280793 DOI: 10.1038/s41589-022-01180-7] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/31/2022]
Affiliation(s)
- Jesko Koehnke
- School of Chemistry, University of Glasgow, Glasgow, UK.
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