Discovery, Biosynthesis, and Rational Engineering of Novel Enterocin and Wailupemycin Polyketide Analogues

The marine actinomycete Streptomyces maritimus produces a structurally diverse set of unusual polyketide natural products including the major metabolite enterocin. Investigations of enterocin biosynthesis revealed that the unique carbon skeleton is derived from an aromatic polyketide pathway which is genetically coded by the 21.3 kb enc gene cluster in S . maritimus . Characterization of the enc biosynthesis gene cluster and subsequent manipulation of it via heterologous expression and/or mutagenesis enabled the discovery of other enc -based metabolites that were produced in only very minor amounts in the wild type. Also described are techniques used to harness the enterocin biosynthetic machinery in order to generate unnatural enc -derived polyketide analogues. This review focuses upon the molecular methods used in combination with classical natural products detection and isolation techniques to access minor metabolites of the S . maritimus secondary metabolome.