EU - NewCat - New catalytic reactions with Lytic polysaccharide monooxygenases (LPMO)

Lytic polysaccharide monooxygenases (LPMO) and cytochrome P450s (CYPs) are copper- and iron-dependent, respectively, enzymatic systems that perform regio- and stereospecific oxidation of non-activated hydrocarbons in Nature. To control such reactions in modern industry and biotechnology is of utmost importance in creating products of value such as secondgeneration bioethanol and products of value for i.e. the pharmaceutical industry. Due to the major drawbacks of using CYPs, including their partially membrane bound nature and the requirement of a reductase in combination with reducing agents such as NAD(P)H to transfer electrons to the active site for oxygen activation, it is highly desirable to develop new type of catalyst that can perform the same type of reactions. An attractive alternative strategy is to engineer LPMOs to perform CYP catalysis. LPMOs are small, robust, easy to produce in large scale, and rigid water-soluble proteins with a plethora of electron donors. The extended, flat LPMO surface, with huge natural sequence variation and thus, likely, mutability, provides a fantastic scaffold for engineering access to the active site as well as substrate affinity. Thus, we aim in the NewCat project to use LPMOs engineered to accommodate typical CYP substrates and immobilize this on solid supports to provide confinement necessary in bringing the oxygen species together with the C-H bond to be oxidized in a tailored, "closed" environment.