Method and means for the production of pharmaceutically active natural products

摘要

Summary Means and a method for the biosynthesis of depsipeptide natural compounds are provided. According to the invention, a nucleic acid molecule comprises a nucleic acid sequence, which encodes a precursor peptide sequence of between 5 and 50 amino acids that is susceptible to post-translational modification, and one or more nucleic acid sequences encoding enzymes for post-translational modification, of which at least one is an ATP-grasp-like ligase enzyme. The nucleic acid molecule can be introduced to cells, preferably prokaryotic cells such as E. coli or Bacillus. A method for the production of depsipeptide natural compounds comprises growing such cells, harvesting and isolating the resultant product.