taxol is used to treatment of variety cancers including ovarian, breast, lung, head and neck carcinomas and the aids-related karposi’s carcinoma, and was originally obtained from bark of taxus brevifolia. however the amount of extracted taxol from taxus is extremely low and cannot be considered as a suitable commercial source and it has led to studies for finding new sources of taxol. in 1998, ...

Branched C5 alcohols are promising biofuels with favorable combustion properties. A mevalonate (MVA)-based isoprenoid biosynthetic pathway for C5 alcohols was constructed in Escherichia coli using genes from several organisms, and the pathway was optimized to achieve over 50% theoretical yield. Although the MVA pathway is energetically less efficient than the native methylerythritol 4-phosphate...

Isoprenoids are a very diverse family of organic compounds widespread in the three domains of life. Although they are produced from the condensation of the same precursors in all organisms (isopentenyl pyrophosphate and dimethylallyl diphosphate), the evolutionary origin of their biosynthesis remains controversial. Two independent nonhomologous metabolic pathways are known: the mevalonate (MVA)...

Hevea brasiliensis Müll. Arg. is a tree that produces natural rubber, an industrially vital isoprenoid polymer. Biosynthesis of natural rubber is known to take place biochemically by a mevalonate (MVA) pathway, but molecular biological characterization of related genes has been insufficient. From H. brasiliensis, we obtained full-length cDNA of genes encoding all of the enzymes that catalyze th...

Terpenoids, compounds found in all domains of life, represent the largest class of natural products with essential roles in their hosts. All terpenoids originate from the five-carbon building blocks, isopentenyl diphosphate (IPP) and its isomer dimethylallyl diphosphate (DMAPP), which can be derived from the mevalonic acid (MVA) and methylerythritol phosphate (MEP) pathways. The absence of two ...

Eukarya, Archaea, and some Bacteria encode all or part of the essential mevalonate (MVA) metabolic pathway clinically modulated using statins. Curiously, two components of the MVA pathway are often absent from archaeal genomes. The search for these missing elements led to the discovery of isopentenyl phosphate kinase (IPK), one of two activities necessary to furnish the universal five-carbon is...

BACKGROUND Protoilludene is a valuable sesquiterpene and serves as a precursor for several medicinal compounds and antimicrobial chemicals. It can be synthesized by heterologous expression of protoilludene synthase in Escherichia coli with overexpression of mevalonate (MVA) or methylerythritol-phosphate (MEP) pathway, and farnesyl diphosphate (FPP) synthase. Here, we present E. coli as a cell f...

Sterols and carotenoids are typical representatives of the group of isoprenoid lipids in plants. All isoprenoids are synthesized by condensation of the two active C5-units: dimethylallyl diphosphate, DMAPP, and isopentenyl diphosphate, IPP. Like animals, higher plants form their sterols via the classical cytosolic acetate/mevalonate (MVA) pathway of IPP biosynthesis. Plants as photosynthetic or...

The depleting petroleum reserve, increasingly severe energy crisis, and global climate change are reigniting enthusiasm for seeking sustainable technologies to replace petroleum as a source of fuel and chemicals. In this paper, the efficiency of the MVA pathway on isoprene production has been improved as follows: firstly, in order to increase MVA production, the source of the "upper pathway" wh...

BACKGROUND Isoprene, a volatile C5 hydrocarbon, is an important platform chemical used in the manufacturing of synthetic rubber for tires and various other applications, such as elastomers and adhesives. RESULTS In this study, Escherichia coli MG1655 harboring Populus trichocarpa isoprene synthase (PtispS) and the exogenous mevalonate (MVA) pathway produced 80 mg/L isoprene. Codon optimizatio...