Siamak Semsary

Total Synthesis of Albicidin: A Lead Structure from Xanthomonas albilineans for Potent Antibacterial Gyrase Inhibitors †

The peptide antibiotic albicidin, which is synthesized by the plant pathogenic bacterium Xanthomonas albilineans, displays remarkable antibacterial activity against various Gram-positive and Gram-negative microorganisms. The low amounts of albicidin obtainable from the producing organism or through heterologous expression are limiting factors in providing sufficient material for bioactivity profiling and structure-activity studies. Therefore, we developed a convergent total synthesis route toward albicidin. The unexpectedly difficult formation of amide bonds between the aromatic amino acids was achieved through a triphosgene-mediated coupling strategy. The herein presented synthesis of albicidin confirms the previously determined chemical structure and underlines the extraordinary antibacterial activity of this compound. The synthetic protocol will provide multigram amounts of albicidin for further profiling of its drug properties.

Synthesis and Antimicrobial Activity of Albicidin Derivatives with Variations of the Central Cyanoalanine Building Block

To investigate the pharmacophore regions of the antibiotic albicidin, derivatives with variations on the central amino acid were synthesized. Charged as well as uncharged residues were chosen to explore the influence of charge, chirality, and steric bulk. The bioactivity of the newly synthesized derivatives was determined by a microdilution technique to obtain minimum inhibitory concentrations (MIC) values. The compounds were also tested in a cell‐free system to obtain information about their ability to inhibit their primary target, DNA gyrase. It was then shown that derivatives with uncharged side chains retain antibacterial activity, whereas incorporation of charged amino acid residues decreases the antibacterial activity dramatically, possibly due to restricted cell penetration of these derivatives. From the newly synthesized derivatives, the threonine derivative shows the most promising results in both tests. The information will help to develop the features of albicidin toward more drug‐like structures.

The O-carbamoyl-transferase Alb15 is responsible for the modification of albicidin

Albicidin is a potent antibiotic and phytotoxin produced by Xanthomonas albilineans which targets the plant and bacterial DNA gyrase. We now report on a new albicidin derivative which is carbamoylated at the N-terminal coumaric acid by the action of the ATP-dependent O-carbamoyltransferase Alb15, present in the albicidin (alb) gene cluster. Carbamoyl-albicidin was characterized by tandem mass spectrometry from cultures of a Xanthomonas overproducer strain and the gene function confirmed by gene inactivation of alb15 in X. albilineans. Expression of alb15 in Escherichia coli and in vitro reconstitution of the carbamoyltransferase activity confirmed albicidin as the substrate. The chemical synthesis of carbamoyl-albicidin finally enabled us to assess its bioactivity by means of in vitro gyrase inhibition and antibacterial assays. Compared to albicidin, carbamoyl-albicidin showed a significantly higher inhibitory efficiency against bacterial gyrase (∼8 vs 49 nM), which identifies the carbamoyl group as an important structural feature of albicidin maturation.

Biosynthetic rivalry of o-aminophenol-carboxylic acids initiates production of hemi-actinomycins in Streptomyces antibioticus

Actinomycins consist of two pentapeptide lactone rings attached to 2-amino-4,6-dimethyl-3-oxo-phenoxazine-1,9-dicarboxylic acid (actinocin). The actinocin moiety is formed through oxidative condensation of two 3-hydroxy-4-methylanthranilic acid (4-MHA) pentapeptide lactones (actinomycin halves) as the last step of actinomycin biosynthesis. We found that feeding of 4-MHA or its putative biogenetic precursor 3-hydroxyanthranilic acid (3-HA) to Streptomyces antibioticus induced formation of different new compounds at the expense of actinomycins. These contain only one pentapeptide lactone ring attached to the β-side of their phenoxazinone ring systems and are formed through premature condensation of the externally added abundant 4-MHA or 3-HA with actinomycin halves. They were termed hemi-actinomycins and C-demethyl-hemi-actinomycins, respectively, which differ from each other in the presence or absence of one or both methyl groups in their phenoxazinone moieties. 3-HA also induces synthesis of various C-demethylactinomycins formed through condensation of actinomycin halves in which 3-HA had been incorporated by the 4-MHA incorporating enzyme in lieu of 4-MHA. 3-HA was not converted to 4-MHA as revealed by its inability to stimulate synthesis of actinomycin or hemi-actinomycin synthesis and thus remained a substrate analogue of 4-MHA rather than its precursor. In contrast to S. antibioticus, actinomycin-producing streptomycetes such as Streptomyces chrysomallus or Streptomyces parvulus do not form hemi-structured actinomycins when fed with 3-HA or 4-MHA. They do not possess the enzyme phenoxazinone synthase (PHS) which in S. antibioticus is present and most probably catalyses premature condensation of abundant 4-MHA or 3-HA with actinomycin halves. Testing hemi-acinomycin IV for drug activity revealed that it intercalates into DNA and inhibits relaxation and supertwisting of DNA by topoisomerase I and DNA-gyrase like actinomycin IV (D). Moreover, it has inhibitory activity on growth of Bacillus subtilis.

Genetic interrelations in the actinomycin biosynthetic gene clusters of Streptomyces antibioticus IMRU 3720 and Streptomyces chrysomallus ATCC11523, producers of actinomycin X and actinomycin C.

Sequencing the actinomycin (acm) biosynthetic gene cluster of Streptomyces antibioticus IMRU 3720, which produces actinomycin X (Acm X), revealed 20 genes organized into a highly similar framework as in the bi-armed acm C biosynthetic gene cluster of Streptomyces chrysomallus but without an attached additional extra arm of orthologues as in the latter. Curiously, the extra arm of the S. chrysomallus gene cluster turned out to perfectly match the single arm of the S. antibioticus gene cluster in the same order of orthologues including the the presence of two pseudogenes, scacmM and scacmN, encoding a cytochrome P450 and its ferredoxin, respectively. Orthologues of the latter genes were both missing in the principal arm of the S. chrysomallus acm C gene cluster. All orthologues of the extra arm showed a G +C-contents different from that of their counterparts in the principal arm. Moreover, the similarities of translation products from the extra arm were all higher to the corresponding translation products of orthologue genes from the S. antibioticus acm X gene cluster than to those encoded by the principal arm of their own gene cluster. This suggests that the duplicated structure of the S. chrysomallus acm C biosynthetic gene cluster evolved from previous fusion between two one-armed acm gene clusters each from a different genetic background. However, while scacmM and scacmN in the extra arm of the S. chrysomallus acm C gene cluster are mutated and therefore are non-functional, their orthologues saacmM and saacmN in the S. antibioticus acm C gene cluster show no defects seemingly encoding active enzymes with functions specific for Acm X biosynthesis. Both acm biosynthetic gene clusters lack a kynurenine-3-monooxygenase gene necessary for biosynthesis of 3-hydroxy-4-methylanthranilic acid, the building block of the Acm chromophore, which suggests participation of a genome-encoded relevant monooxygenase during Acm biosynthesis in both S. chrysomallus and S. antibioticus.

MALDI-TOF mass spectrometry, an efficient technique for in situ detection and characterization of actinomycins.

An extensive study of actinomycins was performed using matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization mass spectrometry (MALDI-TOF MS). Actinomycins represent a well-known family of peptidolactone chromopeptides with potent cytostatic and antibiotic properties. Using five well-characterized streptomycete strains, we introduced MALDI-TOF MS as an efficient technique for rapid in situ detection of actinomycins in surface extracts of cells picked from agar plates. By this procedure, actinomycin complexes can be investigated with high sensitivity and accuracy in a minimum of time. These studies were complemented by mass spectrometric investigation of actinomycins obtained from culture filtrate extracts and purified by high-performance liquid chromatography to detect yet unknown actinomycin species. By feeding experiments, C-demethyl-actinomycins from Streptomyces chrysomallus and Streptomyces parvulus as well as hemi-actinomycins from Streptomyces antibioticus lacking one of the two pentapeptide lactone rings were isolated and characterized as novel variants for structure-activity relationship studies. Structural characterization of the investigated actinomycins was performed by post source decay MALDI-TOF MS. The specific features of the fragmentation patterns of the protonated and cationized forms of selected actinomycins were investigated in detail.