Recently, Prof. Xiaolong Yang and Prof. Russell J. Cox of the Leibniz University (Hanover, Germany) have made great progress on the methylation and of the fungal polyketide synthase. "" was published in Chemical Science (2019, 10, 8478-8489, IF=9.556) Xiaolong Yang is the first author of this article.
In this paper, a novel domain swapping strategy was used to study the carbon chain extension and methylation mechanism of the fungal hybrid PKS-NRPS. This research supplies a guide for the development of new drugs using genetic engineering technology.
Figure 1 Precise engineering of fungal polyketide synthase controls chain-length and methylation pattern
Prof. Xiaolong Yang is a high-level talent introduced by the School of Pharmaceutical Sciences from Chongqing University in 2019. He is committed to the discovery, biological activity evaluation and biosynthesis of novel-structure and medicinal-active natural products from characteristic microorganisms and medicinal plants. Since taking office, Prof. Yang has published a number of papers in the respected journals including Organic Letters, Journal of Natural Products, Organic & Biomolecular Chemistry, as the corresponding author and South-Central University for Nationalities as the first signature unit. Among them, a new skeleton antibacterial active molecule preuisolactone A, published in Organic Letters (2019, 21: 10781081, Nature Index), was listed as a "research hotspot" by Natural Product Reports (2019, 36: 556-560, IF=11.878), and the first total biomimetic synthesis was carried out by Prof. Dirk Trauner, an internationally renowned synthetic chemist. (Journal of the American Chemical Society, 2019, DOI: 10.1021/jacs.9b08892).
Paper link: https://doi.org/10.1039/C9SC03173A
Contributed by Wen Xin from School of Pharmaceutical Sciences
