Crystalline Sponge Method Enabled the Investigation of a Prenyltransferase-terpene Synthase Chimeric Enzyme, Whose Product Exhibits Broadened NMR Signals

By the genome-mining approach, a chimeric enzyme of prenyltransferase-diterpene synthase was discovered from Penicillium chrysogenum MT-12. Since its product exhibited broadened NMR signals, the structural determination by only the NMR analysis was difficult, but the crystalline sponge method successfully revealed the structure with a 6–5–5–5 fused ring system. This demonstrated that the collaboration between the genome-mining and crystalline sponge method has the potential to facilitate rapid inquiries into the unexplored chemical space of small molecules.