Prenyl transfer to aromatic substrates: genetics and enzymology

Aromatic prenyltransferases catalyze the transfer of prenyl moieties to aromatic acceptor molecules and give rise to an astounding diversity of primary and secondary metabolites in plants, fungi and bacteria. Significant progress has been made in the biochemistry and genetics of this heterogeneous group of enzymes in the past years. After 30 years of extensive research on plant prenylflavonoid biosynthesis, finally the first aromatic prenyltransferases involved in the formation of these compounds have been cloned. In bacteria, investigations of the newly discovered family of ABBA prenyltransferases revealed a novel type of protein fold, the PT barrel. In fungi, a group of closely related indole prenyltransferase was found to carry out aromatic prenylations with different substrate specificity and regiospecificity, and to catalyze both regular and reverse prenylations.