Muta-mycosynthesis of naphthalene analogs.

A mutasynthetic strategy is introduced for the mycosynthesis of naphthalene-based molecules (mutadalesols A-F) with directed substitution patterns and new frameworks by generating and using the ΔpksTL mutant strain of Daldinia eschscholzii. (±)-Mutadalesol A and its (+)-enantiomer are cytotoxic, and its (-)-enantiomer inhibits Toll-like receptor 5 (TLR5). The in-culture reactability of fungal oligoketide intermediates with 5-aminonaphthalen-1-ol (ANL) is demonstrated, shedding light on bioorthogonal accesses to unnatural molecule libraries valuable in drug discovery pipelines.