Researchers have identified key ingredients for producing high-value chemical compounds in an environmentally friendly fashion: repurposed enzymes, curiosity, and a little bit of light.
An investigation of two closely related proteins from a pathogenic bacterium has illustrated for the first time how evolution can shape the use of essential metals by enzymes.
Microbes are master chefs of the biomolecular world; collectively, they harbor the ability to produce a vast array of unknown substances, some of which may have therapeutic or other useful properties. In searching for useful products, a team of chemists at Illinois have discovered a whole new class of microbial recipes.
Scientists have sequenced the genomes of nearly 6,900 organisms, but they know the functions of only about half of the protein-coding genes thus far discovered. Now a multidisciplinary effort involving 15 scientists from three institutions has begun chipping away at this mystery – in a big way. Their work to identify the function of one bacterial protein and the biochemical pathway in which it operates will also help identify the functions of hundreds of other proteins.
