Revision of the Cyclisation Mechanism for the Diterpene Spiroviolene and Investigations of Its Mass Spectrometric Fragmentation

Abstract

The diterpene spiroviolene, its diterpene synthase from Streptomyces violens and the experimentally determined terpene cyclisation mechanism were reported in 2017. Recently, the structure of spiroviolene was revised based on a total synthesis, with consequences for the cyclisation mechanism. Herein, a reinvestigation of the terpene cyclisation to spiroviolene and the mass spectrometric fragmentation mechanism investigated by ¹³ C-labelling experiments are presented.

Keywords: biosynthesis; enzyme mechanisms; isotopes; mass spectrometry; terpenes.