ABSTRACT: Black pepper (Piper nigrum) is among the world's most popular spices. Its pungent principle, piperine, has already been identified 200 years ago, yet the biosynthesis of piperine in black pepper remains largely enigmatic. In this report we analyzed the characteristic methylenedioxy bridge formation of the aromatic part of piperine by a combination of RNA-sequencing, functional expression in yeast, and LC-MS based analysis of substrate and product profiles. We identified a single cytochrome P450 transcript, specifically expressed in black pepper immature fruits. The corresponding gene was functionally expressed in yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae) and characterized for substrate specificity with a series of putative aromatic precursors with an aromatic vanilloid structure. Meth

SUBMITTER: Schnabel A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7826766 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature