Isolation and characterization of a novel metagenomic enzyme capable of degrading bacterial phytotoxin toxoflavin

PLoS One. 2018 Jan 2;13(1):e0183893. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0183893. eCollection 2018.

Abstract

Toxoflavin, a 7-azapteridine phytotoxin produced by the bacterial pathogens such as Burkholderia glumae and Burkholderia gladioli, has been known as one of the key virulence factors in crop diseases. Because the toxoflavin had an antibacterial activity, a metagenomic E. coli clone capable of growing well in the presence of toxoflavin (30 μg/ml) was isolated and the first metagenome-derived toxoflavin-degrading enzyme, TxeA of 140 amino acid residues, was identified from the positive E. coli clone. The conserved amino acids for metal-binding and extradiol dioxygenase activity, Glu-12, His-8 and Glu-130, were revealed by the sequence analysis of TxeA. The optimum conditions for toxoflavin degradation were evaluated with the TxeA purified in E. coli. Toxoflavin was totally degraded at an initial toxoflavin concentration of 100 μg/ml and at pH 5.0 in the presence of Mn2+, dithiothreitol and oxygen. The final degradation products of toxoflavin and methyltoxoflavin were fully identified by MS and NMR as triazines. Therefore, we suggested that the new metagenomic enzyme, TxeA, provided the clue to applying the new metagenomic enzyme to resistance development of crop plants to toxoflavin-mediated disease as well as to biocatalysis for Baeyer-Villiger type oxidation.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Amino Acid Sequence
  • Bacterial Toxins / metabolism*
  • Burkholderia / metabolism*
  • Enzymes / metabolism*
  • Metagenomics*
  • Pyrimidinones / metabolism*
  • Sequence Homology, Amino Acid
  • Triazines / metabolism*

Substances

  • Bacterial Toxins
  • Enzymes
  • Pyrimidinones
  • Triazines
  • toxoflavin

Grants and funding

This work was supported by the Intelligent Synthetic Biology Center of Global Frontier Project under grant NRF–2014M3A6A8065315 and the Korea Research Institute of Chemical Technology under grant KK-1507-C04. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.