Two bacterial group II phosphopantetheinyl transferases involved in both primary metabolism and secondary metabolism.

It is known that bacterial group II phosphopantetheinyl transferases (PPTases) usually phosphopantetheinylate acyl carrier proteins (ACPs) involved in the secondary metabolism. For example, a bacterial group II PPTase SchPPT has been known to phosphopantetheinylate only ACPs involved in secondary metabolism, such as scn ACP0-2 and scn ACP7. In this study, we found two bacterial group II PPTases, Hppt and Sppt, could phosphopantetheinylate not only scn ACP0-2 and scn ACP7, but also sch FAS ACP, an ACP involved in primary metabolism. Swapping of the N terminus and C terminus of PPTases showed that (i) both the hybrids Hppt-Sppt and Sppt-Hppt could phosphopantetheinylate sch FAS ACP but not scn ACP0-2; (ii) both the hybrids Sppt-SchPPT and SchPPT-Sppt lost abilities to phosphopantetheinylate sch FAS ACP and scn ACP0-2. Hppt and Sppt represent group II PPTases which phosphopantetheinylate both ACPs involved in primary metabolism and ACPs involved in secondary metabolism.