Reprogramming Escherichia coli for the production of prenylated indole diketopiperazine alkaloids

Prenylated indole diketopiperazine (DKP) alkaloids are important bioactive molecules or their precursors. In the context of synthetic biology, efficient means for their biological production would increase their chemical diversification and the discovery of novel bioactive compounds. Here, we prove the suitability of the Escherichia coli chassis for the production of prenylated indole DKP alkaloids. We used enzyme combinations not found in nature by co-expressing bacterial cyclodipeptide synthases (CDPSs) that assemble the DKP ring and fungal prenyltransferases (PTs) that transfer the allylic moiety from the dimethylallyl diphosphate (DMAPP) to the indole ring of tryptophanyl-containing cyclodipeptides. Of the 11 tested combinations, seven resulted in the production of eight different prenylated indole DKP alkaloids as determined by LC-MS/MS and NMR characterization. Two were previously undescribed. Engineering E. coli by introducing a hybrid mevalonate pathway for increasing intracellular DMAPP levels improved prenylated indole DKP alkaloid production. Purified product yields of 2–26 mg/L per culture were obtained from culture supernatants. Our study paves the way for the bioproduction of novel prenylated indole DKP alkaloids in a tractable chassis that can exploit the cyclodipeptide diversity achievable with CDPSs and the numerous described PT activities.