Introduction
Biocatalysis has become an important aspect of modern organic synthesis, both in academia and across the chemical and pharmaceutical sciences [1,2]. Its success has been largely due to a rapid expansion of the range of chemical reactions accessible, made possible by advanced tools for enzyme discovery and protein engineering. As the enzyme toolbox for biocatalysis has expanded, so has the potential for the construction of powerful enzyme cascades for efficient and selective synthesis of target molecules. The dramatic increase of biocatalysts that are now available can make design of enzyme cascades highly challenging, in particular to the non-expert.
In this talk, I will present the application of RetroBioCat [3], an intuitive and accessible tool for computer-aided design of biocatalytic cascades and its implementation in a number of de novo multistep biosynthetic sequences towards chiral amines and amino-polyols.[4]
[1] Bell, E.L.; Finnigan, W.; France, S.P.; Green, A.P.; Hayes, M.A.; Hepworth, L.J.; Lovelock, S.L.; Niikura, H.; Osuna, S.; Romero, E.; Ryan, K.S.; Turner, N.J.; Flitsch, S.L. Nature Reviews Methods Primers 2021, 1, 46
[2] Romero, E.; Jones, B.S.; Hogg, B.N.; Casamajo, A.R.; Hayes, M.A.; Flitsch, S.L.; Turner, N.J.; Schnepel, C.; Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2021, 60(31), 16824
[3] Finnigan, W.; Hepworth, L.J.; Flitsch, S.L.; Turner, N.J.; Nature Catalysis 2021, 4, 98
[4] Mattey, A.P.; Ford, G.J.; Citoler, J.; Baldwin, C.; Marshall, J.R.; Palmer, R.B.; Thompson, M.; Turner, N.J.; Cosgrove, S.C.; Flitsch, S.L. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2021, 60(34), 18660