Quantitative exploration of the catalytic landscape separating divergent plant sesquiterpene synthases.

ABSTRACT: Throughout molecular evolution, organisms create assorted chemicals in response to varying ecological niches. Catalytic landscapes underlie metabolic evolution, wherein mutational steps alter the biosynthetic properties of enzymes. Here we report the first systematic quantitative characterization of the catalytic landscape underlying the evolution of sesquiterpene chemical diversity. On the basis of our previous discovery of a set of nine naturally occurring amino acid substitutions that functionally interconverted orthologous sesquiterpene synthases from Nicotiana tabacum and Hyoscyamus muticus, we created a library of all possible residue combinations (2(9) = 512) in the N. tabacum enzyme. The product spectra of 418 active enzymes revealed a rugged landscape where several minimal combina

SUBMITTER: O'Maille PE 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2664519 | biostudies-literature | 2008 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature