friedelane and celastrol

Celastrol is a promising bioactive compound isolated from Tripterygium wilfordii and has been shown to possess many encouraging preclinical applications. However, the celastrol biosynthetic pathway is poorly understood, especially the key oxidosqualene cyclase (OSC) enzyme responsible for cyclisation of the main scaffold. Here, we report on the isolation and characterisation of three OSCs from T. wilfordii: TwOSC1, TwOSC2 and TwOSC3. Both TwOSC1 and TwOSC3 were multiproduct friedelin synthases, while TwOSC2 was a β-amyrin synthase. We further found that TwOSC1 and TwOSC3 were involved in the biosynthesis of celastrol and that their common product, friedelin, was a precursor of celastrol. We then reconstituted the biosynthetic pathway of friedelin in engineered yeast constructed by the CRISPR/Cas9 system, with protein modification and medium optimisation, leading to heterologous production of friedelin at 37.07 mg l

Topics: Acetates; Amino Acid Sequence; Biosynthetic Pathways; Cyclization; Cyclopentanes; Gene Expression Regulation, Plant; Intramolecular Transferases; Molecular Docking Simulation; Mutagenesis; Organ Specificity; Oxylipins; Pentacyclic Triterpenes; Phylogeny; RNA Interference; RNA, Messenger; Saccharomyces cerevisiae; Tripterygium; Triterpenes; Up-Regulation