Heterologous Biosynthesis of the Sterol -Acyltransferase Inhibitor Helvamide Unveils an α-Ketoglutarate-Dependent Cross-Linking Oxygenase.

We have identified the biosynthetic gene cluster () for the sterol -acyltransferase inhibitor helvamide () from the genome of MST-FP2007. Heterologous expression of in produced a previously unreported analog helvamide B (). An α-ketoglutarate-dependent oxygenase Hvm1 was shown to catalyze intramolecular cyclization of to yield .

Fusion Enzymes Involved in Biosynthetic Tailoring Reactions in Fungi.

Enzyme fusion, the fusion of enzymes with different domains to a single protein, has been widely recognized as a promising strategy in the development of biocatalysts. Nature has evolved gene fusion to combine different catalytic enzymes to function as a fusion enzyme, and this strategy is utilized in many natural product biosynthetic pathways. Owing to rapid advances in genome sequencing and biosynthetic pathway characterization, there is increasing interest in fusion enzymes from fungal biosynthetic pathways, particularly those involved in tailoring steps.

Cloning of the non-structural gene 3 of hepatitis C virus and its inducible expression in cultured cells.

AIM:To study the inducible expression of hepatitis C virus ns3 gene (HCV ns3) in eukaryotic cells.METHODS: The ns3 gene was obtained from plasmid pBns3 by polymerase chain reaction and inserted into the cloning vector pGEM-T. Then, the ns3 was subcloned into the vector pMSG to generate dexamethasone (DM)-inducible expression plasmid pMSG-ns3.