Designing a Novel Multienzyme Cascade with a Coenzyme Self-Recycling System for the Synthesis of 2-Phenylethyl-β-d-glucopyranoside from Phenylalanine.

Phenylethanoid glycosides (PhGs) are glycoconjugates composed of phenylethyl alcohols and glycoside moieties, exhibiting diverse bioactivities. 2-Phenylethyl-β-d-glucopyranoside (2PE-Glc) is the simplest form of PhGs. We successfully designed and implemented a novel multienzyme cascade system with cofactor self-recycling capabilities for the efficient synthesis of 2PE-Glc from l-phenylalanine (L-Phe). First, different phenylalanine dehydrogenases involved in the cascade system were compared, and PheDH was selected for the deamination reaction. Subsequently, the rate-limiting step was determined to be phenylacetaldehyde reduction, and ADH was screened out and evolved by consensus design, leading to a mutant ADH, which exhibited 1.74 times the activity of the wild type. Finally, five enzymes were coexpressed in BL21 (DE3) to construct a multienzyme cascade system, and the reaction conditions of conversion of l-Phe to 2PE-Glc catalyzed by the multienzyme cascade system were optimized. Under the optimal reaction conditions, the yield of 2PE-Glc reached 27.62 mM (7.85 g/L) in a fed-batch reaction. This work not only provides an effective strategy for the biosynthesis of 2PE-Glc but also demonstrates the potential of the multienzyme cascade system in the synthesis of biologically active complex glycoconjugates.