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Biosynthesis of the secondary metabolite prodigiosin in Serratia: assembly of a bioactive natural product

Reference	P15987
Principal Investigator / Supervisor	Professor George Salmond
Co-Investigators / Co-Supervisors	Dr Finian Leeper
Institution	University of Cambridge
Department	Biochemistry
Funding type	Research
Value (£)	386,748
Status	Completed
Type	Research Grant
Start date	01/01/2002
End date	31/05/2005
Duration	41 months

Abstract

Serratia species make the red tripyrrole antibiotic, prodigiosin. Prodigiosins have a range of antimicrobial activities and have been shown to exhibit interesting pharmacological functions. We have sequenced the pigment biosynthetic gene cluster from Serratia and intend to dissect the mechanisms of pigment production. We will: 1) engineer polar and non-polar insertion mutations in the 15 pig genes (pigA-0); 2) use the mutants in syntrophic analysis to establish the order of enzyme action; 3) characterise the metabolic intermediates; 4) use dual isotopic labelling to confirm the routes of precursor channelling into prodigiosin, 5) investigate individual enzymes of the pathway for substrate range; 6) overproduce enzymes for crystallisation trials; 7) investigate genetic diversity of prodigiosin pigment gene organisation in natural isolates.

Summary

unavailable

Committee	Closed Committee - Plant & Microbial Sciences (PMS)
Research Topics	X – not assigned to a current Research Topic
Research Priority	X – Research Priority information not available
Research Initiative	X - not in an Initiative
Funding Scheme	X – not Funded via a specific Funding Scheme

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